Goodbye, Nostalgia
by zazial
Summary: When the Ministry falls to Voldemort, Percy Weasley and Oliver Wood find themselves in an unexpected alliance to help muggle-borns. Meanwhile, why is everyone trying to find a confused lawyer named Audrey?
1. People didn't care for lawyers

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Oliver Wood sat uncomfortably between Puddlemere United Chasers Joselind Wadcock and Dorian Nox. The three of them were sitting in an office that could have been any muggle lawyer's office – crisp, professional, and too full of straight lines. The difference of course, was that the lawyer in question was no muggle, but a witch.

Dorian shifted uncomfortably on Oliver's left, the blonde lawyer paid no heed, she was intentionally making them sit guiltily in the silence of her too non-magical office while she read the parchment listing their infractions. The calendar, clock and files on the shelves were all too still and gray, and the mechanical 'tick' 'tick' of the Seiko wall clock was bugging Oliver more than anything else. To force three athletic Quidditch players used to activity to sit still was perhaps a punishment too severe for their actions.

The only magical object in the office – the self-stirring spoon that soundlessly circled in the lawyer's tea – was the only thing that kept Joscelind to his right sane for the moment it seemed, and she was muggle-born! He could almost read her thoughts: "This is insane, I'm a living Quidditch legend, and here I am, reduced to seeking comfort in a teaspoon." She was the most relaxed of them despite this as there was no real trouble that she could get into, but as others respected that the pitch was her kingdom, she respected the authority of their lawyer in her office, so she sat still.

Oliver had been warned before that the last thing he wanted to do was to get into so much trouble that the team would have to call in one of their resident Quidditch lawyers. People did not care much for lawyers even in the Wizarding World, and spending time with them was rather unpleasant.

Oliver found that Ms. Audrey Beridore herself did not make him uneasy (unlike with Dorian's case), he was used to stiff personalities after rooming with Percy Weasley for seven years but he did find her silence unsettling. Even Percy opened his mouth to talk (too much usually but that was who he was). There was something extremely frightening about a person who just stayed silent but took in too much. In fact, if it were not for that statue-still expression that Ms. Beridore had on her face, or the severe lawyer robes that she wore, she could have been a very attractive woman. She had that nordic pale skin and large hazel eyes that preserved some softness in her look. Of course those pale cheeks were currently flushing slightly as she read the list of their infractions.

Now Oliver did shift uncomfortably, though it had nothing to do with Ms. Beridore and everything to do with that angry flush that was starting to form on her cheeks. He had memories of Hogwarts and the consequences of a Head Boy's angry flush but Percy was not scary after seven years rooming. Percy would explode if he truly got angry and you'd never hear the end of it (you definitely got used to it even if it was irritating). Audrey Beridore however, struck Oliver as the kind that could just look at you when she was angry and you'd freeze to death.

"It appears to me that the damage done to muggle public property is the main fault of the Quidditch hooligans."

Ah, she finally speaks. Oliver was about to say something but he took the cue from the senior Quidditch players on his left and right and stayed silent.

"But Mr. Wood," she looked up and looked him straight in the eyes, unblinking "Would you care to fully explain why you felt the need to become involved in the fight that led to the serious injury of six muggles?"

"Ms. Beridore, I had nothing to do with injuring the six muggles, I was in the wrong place at the wrong time." He expected a raised eyebrow, a tautness in the lip, anything in her expression that would show disbelief, as he had already explained himself numerous times and it was clear that no one believed him. But her face did nothing. 'Surely,' Oliver thought to himself 'Lawyers should be good at feigning some sort of emotion or interest in something? They're bloody actors after all.'

"I'm willing to believe you Mr. Wood but you know that no one else who has heard your story has believed you, even with Joscelind and Dorian here vouching for you, and Joscelind is considered a Quidditch hero." Her expression softened, perhaps she did believe him?

"For Merlin's sake! I'll drink Veristaserum if they want me to! I'm telling the truth!"

"There is no need to get excited Mr. Wood, I'm just trying to instill in you the severity of these charges, especially in these tense times, people will be looking for any kind of scapegoat. I don't want the tabloids or Rita Skeeter to be making up stories about Death Eater sympathizers on the team – now, now, don't look at me like that, I know you are not one of them – but we are dealing with popular perception and the team's image. I trust you are telling the truth, and I trust Joscelind and Dorian's word…even though Dorian is unhappy to be in my office, once again. What you need to tell me is the entire story: what you were doing in the crowd in the first place, why you got involved, and how in Merlin's name you were caught in that highly compromising position of holding a bludger bat with the muggle's blood on it!"

Well now, did she mean what she said or was she just…being a lawyer? Oliver decided to believe she was sincere. "I…I won't deny that I got involved in the crisis. I know they warn us to stay clear of the hooligans when they get all riled up but riot control was slow in arriving and I went in to do what I could to calm them down or get others safely away."

Dorian smirked "Bloody Gryffindors. You can always tell with the young ones, they still think they're in school." Joscelin returned the smile. Audrey said and did nothing.

"Oh that's right Audrey, you were home schooled, you didn't go to Hogwarts."

"If you don't mind Dorian, I want to hear the rest of Oliver's story. I can listen to tales of your alma mater later."

Dorian shut up.

"Carry on Oliver, and you can call me Audrey. Ms. Beridore is just too formal, I'm actually rather uncomfortable with it."

"Well Audrey, I was fighting a losing battle and got caught up in the madness, trying to defend myself from some of the worst of them. I saw Joscelind and Dorian try to get to me and then this guy pulled me in another direction and a few pushes and punches later I'm in a completely different street and some different guy is swinging at me with this bloody beater's bat. I wrestled it from him and took a swing to try and knock him out. I missed and he ran off. I was about to chase when the riot control arrived just at that moment. I turned around and that's when I saw the six muggles. They must have gotten seriously lost to end up in a Wizarding establishment. I know that the area is heavily warded during major events like a Quidditch match."

Audrey sighed, everyone in the room knew that it was the worst possible story anyone could have but unfortunately for Oliver, it was true and it really was that muddled. She looked at the two senior players "Joscelind, Dorian? What did you see?"

Joscelind answered for both Chasers, being the most senior in the room. "Audrey you've only been with us for two years, but we've thrown a lot of tough things at you and you've managed to clear us most the time." She smirked at the thought of Dorian and the word 'most'. "I know this case will be tough, but there's not more than what Oliver said. I saw him caught in the crowd trying to protect the other fans who were trying to run away, he was trying to prevent a stampede and further injury. Of course, he was alone and couldn't do it. We should have been watching him from early on, he is…still rather young, well, he's our youngest player and Dorian is right, young ones can get caught up in the…excitement of things." That is, most young players got caught up in the celebrity spotlight of playing for one of the league's best teams. Oliver did not do that, he just did more ridiculous things such as jumping into a crowd of raging maniacs.

Dorian turned to give Oliver a look after the latter's expression started to harden in irritation. That look said 'Keep quiet if you know what's good for you right now.' Oliver gritted his teeth and kept still.

"Oliver was being brave, seeing innocents in trouble, and he jumped into the fray. This was the first time he saw violence break out at a game and honestly, even I thought that that particular issue was improving. The next time we play we definitely need to absolutely demand better security. But anyway, we didn't see Oliver until it was too late and he was getting pulled into the mob. We went after him, Dorian and I, and got caught up in the fray of it too…keeping our noses intact, so of course yes, we knocked a few people out in self-defense. We didn't catch up to him until it was too late, we saw a man run out of the alley but he was wearing large, nondescript robes and his hair was over his face. Unfortunately, long dark coloured hair is only too common these days. Then of course, the authorities found Oliver the same time we did."

Audrey leaned back in her seat, regarding the three players. "So there are no other witnesses to this mysterious man. At least there are two witnesses, though the prosecution will try to cast doubt upon the both of you. Thankfully however, Joselind is a living legend, so that won't go too far. The problem won't really be winning the case, it will be publicity management, convincing everyone of the truth: that Puddlemere keeps no muggle-haters on its team." She reached to another scroll on her left and read it. "We also have a case because the Ministry messed up. They modified the muggles' memories before checking them. Surely they must have realized that at least one of the six would have gotten an image of a bat waving madman. I'm most interested in how those muggles found Falmouth in the first place – despite all the wards."

"The Ministry's been messing up a lot lately." Dorian grumbled "They're searching for You-Know-Who with fervor since Scrimgeour took over but when it comes to the smaller things they're rather careless. I suppose sport hooliganism didn't fall under 'potential dark arts' for them to do a proper job."

Audrey raised an eyebrow "Well I'm glad that they're trying to control the hysteria. Otherwise they'd cancel Quidditch games. In fact, they're likely trying to decide on that now."

"CANCEL Quidditch?!"

"Oliver," Joscelind laid a hand on his shoulder "Calm down."

"But they can't cancel Quidditch!"

"But they can." Dorian stood, needing to move, do something after Audrey's initial punishment, rather, her test on them to gauge their guilt for her own opinion. "You see Oliver, people are tense, they're becoming more volatile and that's not even counting the fact that the pitch exposes millions of spectators as easy targets to potential Death Eater attacks."

"No!" Oliver stood and stared at everyone in the room as if they had all gone mad for not finding the prospect of cancelled Quidditch absolutely horrifying "This is a tense time yes, but that's why we need Quidditch! Look, it's not just a sport, it's a unifying key identity for the Wizarding World! It's one thing besides magic that Wizards all over the world have in common! Quidditch is our main sport, even Quodpot is just an insane rip off! And in times of stress, people want to come out and play, watch people play, and just…lose themselves for a moment you know? Who has time to think of You-Know-Who when you're watching that last second before the Seeker catches the snitch, or the Chaser make that amazing goal?! This is what people need! Recreation, relaxation, and a reminder of who they are. I mean look…Quidditch is more than just a game, it's not about expensive brooms or the great profit-maker it is, it's, it's…a source of unity for people. I mean okay, we cheer for different teams but we all love the sport! We need that right now, with You-Know-Who on the loose, we need a reason to remember that we're united!"

And he was met by a shocked silence because that was the most anyone there had ever heard him say before. He sounded like a Ministry Quidditch propaganda brochure, save that he actually believed his words. Dorian opened his mouth as if to say something but snapped it shut.

Audrey broke the silence, with sympathy in her voice, "I admire your passion Oliver, and I'm especially touched that you can talk about unity from Quidditch and believe it after witnessing what the game inspired in the crowd yesterday that landed you in this mess in the first place."

Oliver shut his eyes. It was terrible that the most important thing in his life was possibly about to be taken from him, and no one could see what that meant. No one could see that yes, tense crowds and hooliganism was unacceptable but canceling Quidditch would make things so much worse. It did not help that the damned lawyer sounded so dry.

He felt something put into his hand. He opened his eyes and stared, it was a new cup of hot tea. Audrey had put it there and was standing in front of him now. She smiled slightly, a bare upturn of the corners of her mouth and the hardness in her eyes softened.

"Drink it, it'll calm you down. She walked back to her desk "Don't lose sight of the fact that Quidditch means the world to everyone in this room Oliver. Even myself. You'll just have to learn Oliver, that people will sacrifice anything: their freedoms, their passions, their very identity just for some kind of security. It may not be right but that's what they do and that is the way it is." She flicked her wand at her door and it opened.

"Now Oliver, you think on that. And I believe that the three of you should go home and rest before the hearing tomorrow. I'm going to try and make a case out of this mess. Have a good day."


	2. A Chance Meeting

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 2

Joscelind and Dorian left Oliver to his own devices after making sure he got to his room at the Hog's Head. They warned him to be careful, take care of himself and to get plenty of rest. Oliver unfortunately, was feeling quite restless and decided to take a walk around Diagon Alley.

It was a weekday and right after lunch hour so the streets were fairly quiet. It made him sad actually, realizing that the streets were really getting too quiet lately even on free days as fear took over the community. He was already getting strange glances from people for walking around on his own…no one walked on their own anymore.

He had vague memories of You-Know-Who terror from before, he was five and for most of his childhood his parents had managed to hide the awful fearful truth from him by playing a game. Quidditch saved his childhood, provided him with one, and gave his family something to do to keep the fear at bay. Of course he did not play outside and properly. No, at first he was wearing out toy broomsticks and then the rest was raptly listening to his parents explain the rules to him. They would play miniature matches in the bedrooms or living room, using scrunched up wads of parchment or enchanted marbles made to fly. There were times of course when they would be hiding silently, thinking that some kind of evil was outside, but afterwards, when they were lucky enough to still be alive, his parents would distract him with the game again. Mr. and Mrs. Wood after all, were fighting their own private battle against You-Know-Who. If that dark wizard thought he could steal all the happiness from the land like a Dementor then he was wrong. They were happy, they were teaching their son Quidditch and together they shared the true warmth and love of a family. Even if their house was burned to the ground tomorrow, or they were all killed, at least they'd all die knowing that they were happy together, rebelling against the Dark Lord.

The first time he properly flew on a real broomstick at Hogwarts after a few crashes, Oliver felt truly liberated, and that was the end of the first war for him, the realization that now nothing would get in the way of him and the wonderful game. The game saved him before, well, it would continue to be a beacon of hope to the future. When it turned out that the Boy Who Lived was a natural seeker…it only made serendipitous sense.

Lost in thought Oliver collided with someone. Both had quickly whipped their wands out before realizing who he had bumped into. Oliver smirked, it appeared that the fear was getting to him too if an accidental bump in the street set him so on edge.

"Sorry about that Percy." That was Oliver's greeting to his former roommate as if they had been in touch since graduation. They sent each other Christmas cards, that was about it.

"Oliver Wood? What are you doing walking around alone? Have you not heard the Ministry's warnings about that? We're caught in a dangerous situation here!" Really, it was just like they were still rooming together yesterday.

Oliver wondered about how he had to deal with two of the stiffest people he knew he would know in his life in just one day and decided to make light of it. "Sorry Percy, I just finished a meeting with my lawyer, about that mess yesterday." He knew his old roommate was in the Ministry and probably knew about that incident with the hooligans. "And why are you walking alone?"

Percy let out an exasperated sigh, his hair was falling over his glasses and he looked considerably exhausted. The glasses did not disguise the dark circles under his eyes and Oliver had not thought it possibly that he'd see Percy even more stressed out than at Hogwarts. "I'm with the Ministry! It's an urgent errand which is why I didn't get anyone to come with me, no time. Anyway, I hear you have a hearing tomorrow. Honestly Oliver, how did you get yourself caught in that situation?" Percy noted their surroundings, checking for eavesdroppers before he started yelling about a confidential trial. His voice dropped a few notches "I read the file Oliver, how in Merlin's name were you caught holding a bludger bat with muggle blood on it!? I know you're not a muggle-hater, they have nothing to do with Quidditch! Don't even know it exists."

Oliver felt he was being struck with a severe case of deja-vu when he realized that Percy had just repeated a question that Audrey asked him earlier that day…almost word for word, and unfortunately in a rather similar tone. "You'll have to read the reports on the trial after they're released tomorrow Percy, it'll take too long to explain here. Unless of course, the finding is somehow a completely different truth than the way I see it, if that's the case then if you feel like hearing my interpretation of events, you can ask me again."

Percy was about to make some indignant retort when Oliver interrupted "You know as a Ministry official you should be setting an example to civilians such as myself and not travel alone. Which way are you heading? I'm probably headed that way too, then we won't be breaking a rule." Percy, miraculously did not make any noise on that and nodded "I'm going to Gringotts." Oliver thought on that and decided he should check on his accounts. If there was anything he was learning to hate about this scare it was the company of other people without the paranoia. He and Percy were never very close but Percy still shared Hogwarts with him, and in fact as his only roommate, took up a good amount of his memories of the castle. "So am I. Well that solves that then."

They began to walk towards the bank and had nothing to say to each other. Oliver had heard about Percy walking out on his family and thought that he'd have nothing to say to the man about that but then, he realized that his former roommate would have to have his say on his side of the story sometime. Percy meanwhile was either too anxious on his errand for small talk or had decided that Oliver was beneath his notice now that he was following rules.

"You know Percy the funny thing is," he paused to make sure Percy was actually listening to him "I think you should meet my lawyer." He smirked, thinking that she'd definitely teach the long-winded bastard a lesson in humility.

Percy of course, took the comment the wrong way "What on earth are you going on about Oliver? What have I done that you wish to _sue_ me?!"

"No Percy! I'm not trying to sue you! I just meant you should meet my lawyer. I think you'd both, erm, benefit from meeting each other, get along well." Either that or kill each other instantly he thought to himself.

"Oliver! How old are you? Twelve? We're back in a war here. Maybe you don't remember what it was like before but I do, I remember being five and living in absolute fear of my life. We've caught this at the beginning, and this time the Ministry is going to stop him early! They won't let him gather power again! They won't let him put another generation in fear, make more children grow up like that. That's what we're doing now Oliver! There's no time to go about…_socializing_ now! We had a lull, it was wonderful, peace at Hogwarts, it felt good to feel safe. But those days are over now Oliver, it's time we all grew up!" Percy stomped a faster pace to Gringotts now, keeping three steps in front of Oliver.

"Don't you understand you stubborn, rule-abiding twat?! That's what he wants! He wants us to fear! He wants us to completely forget ourselves, forget who we are, sacrifice our happiness just at the mere thought of him! Well not me, I'm not going to give him that satisfaction!"

They were just a few steps in front of Gringotts now, Percy stomped still and turned, red in the face and yelling "You think it's that easy Wood?! You think we're going to win this war without sacrifices?! You're going to get yourself killed! You're all going to get yourselves killed just because you're all too stubborn to-to…" Percy took a deep breath, still red, then he took another. There was a long silence as Oliver glared and waited, demanded that Percy finish his sentence.

"But then," Percy finally began again, not looking at Oliver and suddenly looking even wearier than before, his eyes focused somewhere in the distance to his right, "We all need to stand up for what we believe in." Percy looked at Oliver again "Stand up for what you believe in then, preposterous though it may be, just…be careful and for Merlin's sake keep your head down and don't get hurt. There are too many people getting hurt just because we can't be united in this." Then he turned and entered the bank.

Oliver looked to where Percy was staring just a moment before and saw Fred and George's shop in the row facing him. With a final look around the sparsely populated streets, Oliver entered the bank.


	3. Trial

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

**Chapter 3**

"Ms. Beridore, you have provided no tangible evidence to prove to me that your client is innocent of assaulting the six muggles, as all your witnesses can say is that they saw a man running from the alley. An unidentifiable man nonetheless. This could have been another possible victim running from your client's rampage, or a result of their confusion in the crowd."

The trial had begun well enough, Audrey deployed the tactics that rarely ever failed her in the courtroom; flat logic, persuasiveness and a tone of voice that usually let no one doubt her opinion. For the entire time, Madam Leonis stared uninterested at the court floor. There was just a single judge as the charges, though serious, did not warrant more. What surprised Audrey as she walked in with Oliver, Joscelind and Dorian, was the presence of Scrigmeour's junior undersecretary: Percy Weasley. She considered it part of her job as a muggle-raised witch working in the wizarding world to know the names, titles and basic gossip of those in the Ministry of Magic that surrounded the Minister but this was the first she'd seen the assistant in person. Now why on earth was the Minister for Magic himself interested in this case? Besides, the judge she was dealing with was an absolute idiot in Audrey's personal opinion, her statement was absolutely baseless and for the first time in a trial, she began to feel a cold fury envelop her.

"Madam Leonis, there is also no tangible evidence that my client is guilty of these charges! This is the direct fault of the Magical Law Enforcement Patrol putting terribly trained security in charge of Falmouth Pitch."

Everyone bristled at her accusation of Ministry incompetence. This was not her usual style – furious temper was better done by Arcadia, her former colleague – but she felt the situation was ridiculous enough to call for it. Audrey noticed however, that Scrimgeour's assistant, who was acting as court scribe, was looking especially livid.

"Ms. Beridore, if you have to start accusing the Ministry itself of incompetence then you are already losing your case."

"Madam Leonis, the wizarding world knows of the great steps the Ministry is taking in the hunt for He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named, but we also accept that the consequences of such a mobilization of our security forces leaves behind only those who are inadequately trained to deal with matters that the Ministry currently believes are inconsequential to the hunt. The hooliganism that broke out at Falmouth was a result of the frustration that the regular people are feeling about living in fear; however, the botched operation that has led to the grievous lack of evidence in this case is a direct result of those novices who were left in charge of the crowd."

Audrey turned to pick up some parchments from her table before turning to face the unsympathetic judge again.

"It is unfortunate that we will now never know the truth of the events that led to the grievous injury of the six muggles as the riot control officers at Falmouth Pitch – who were dispatched by the Ministry – instantly performed amateur obliviate charms to modify their memories rather than wait for the higher authorities to arrive. I know that they acted rashly due to the chaos that was facing them. I know that the situation warranted split-second decisions that none of them could have known were correct or not. However, that does not change the fact that it would have been a simple matter of extracting the memories of the six muggles to gain the identity of the perpetrator. Now because those charms were carelessly applied, the six muggles are at risk of permanent memory loss."

Audrey held up a parchment and a muggle piece of paper – one was the report from a mediwitch from St. Mungo's who was on call and whom evaluated the muggles after the disastrous charm was applied, and the other was from the muggle hospital which now housed the six victims.

"I present these articles as evidence of their condition. Without their memories, there can be no charges. You cannot prove that my client is guilty, and if you try to push these charges…the Quidditch world will have to wonder exactly what has inspired the Ministry to force a young man with a bright future ahead of him with no proven guilt to be the scapegoat for this grave incompetence."

The entire courtroom remained silent at Audrey's threat of publicity. This could become messy press war, and the Ministry could not afford any more negative publicity, they had to look like they were doing something, catching people, and not making mistakes. If it got out that Magical Law Enforcement had made another mistake, no one would even pay attention to the original story of the six injured muggles. However, what Audrey wanted from this case was for Oliver to walk, that way the press would not have either story of any Ministry mistakes or a possible muggle-hater in the league in their efforts to shut this up. She was making a huge gamble, and this was not her usual style in the courtroom at all.

"Ms. Beridore," the judge called with barely controlled fury "We cannot believe you would accuse this Ministry of trying to use your client as a scapegoat, and we lament the loss of faith any citizen has of us." Her tone made it extremely clear that in her opinion, no one in this room was lamenting anything or cared about Audrey's opinion. She paused in thought, keeping the entire room sweating in nervous waiting.

"Due to lack of evidence, this court cannot find Oliver Wood guilty of any charges. An investigation will be launched into Ms. Beridore's suggestion of Magical Law Enforcement incompetence. This hearing is closed."

Madam Leonis banged her gavel, swiftly stood up and with barely a look to the accused party, left the courtroom. The assistant seemed to have deflated somewhat at the mention of an investigation but still no less furious than before. In fact, he looked even more furious, so furious that he was red in the face and had not finished writing the closing points of the case. He was in the process of replacing the quill that he had broken when Audrey decided she shouldn't watch him anymore, turned and took her party outside.

After passing the doors, the three Quidditch players stopped, forcing Audrey to stop with them.

"Have you absolutely gone MAD?!" Dorian demanded.

"What were you thinking?!" Joscelind looked even more confused. Audrey had to agree with them, the way she handled the latter part of that trial was completely out of character for her. She wondered what exactly had happened herself.

"I know it's not my…traditional method, but it worked, Oliver's free, and no bad publicity."

However, Oliver looked far from happy. In fact he had begun to look quite insulted ever since she brought up the entire incompetence issue.

"Well Oliver, what is it?" she demanded. She just saved his skin after all.

"Now the entire Ministry thinks I'm guilty. I got off on a technicality."

"For heaven's sake Oliver! What do you think I am? Some kind of a miracle worker? I'm a lawyer! And I did what I could with the evidence available. Besides, it was the truth that you did not harm anyone. Justice was served today."

"How can you say that?!" He was setting his jaw again, a sure sign he was angry "You used me as an excuse to risk a publicity war between Quidditch and the Ministry! If they cancel Quidditch because of this…and anyway, this isn't the best of times and shouldn't we all be trying to cooperate? Us fighting each other, isn't that what You-Know-Who wants?"

Audrey looked at the three Quidditch players who had, it appeared, ganged up on her despite what she had just done for them. She decided to try a different tactic before she lost her temper at them "Listen you three. Did you see who else was in there?"

"Court stenographer."

"Percy Weasley."

Dorian and Oliver answered at the same time.

"Dorian, that 'Court stenographer as you call him is the junior undersecretary to our august Minister." Audrey took care to say that statement with her usual frostiness "Now why do you think Scrigmeour himself has taken an interest in this case? Something isn't right."

"Is that what set you off?" Dorian asked.

"Excuse me?"

"I've gotten into a lot of trouble before Audrey, so I've seen you in court many times, you've never been like that. You're always in control of yourself but today you were angry, really angry."

"Alright, I wasn't happy to see the Minister of Magic spying on us, if that's what you mean. Look, he's better than Fudge but he's still not my first choice. And his assistant, what was that boy's problem anyway?" She was getting angry again, she did not know why.

"Percy was my roommate at Hogwarts, and he believes in the Ministry about as much as I believe in Quidditch." Oliver answered.

Audrey widened her eyes, it somehow struck her as a rather dumb idea to have that much faith in a governmental body.

"So despite the fact that you accused the very thing that he thinks is going to save our world of absolute incompetence and general idiocy, you've also just possibly put his father into a lot of trouble."

"His father?"

"From what I recall, his Dad is quite involved with Muggle relations, usually when the Ministry does anything wrong regarding that, they put the blame on him, even though he's not actually officially involved with Magical Law Enforcement."

Audrey stared at Oliver, eyes widening at what she heard. He was staring at her as if expecting some sort of guilt to crash down on her. For some strange reason, even though she did not know this assistant or his father she did feel it. Then, needing to defend herself, she recalled a piece of gossip she heard while researching the new Minister of Magic and his various hanger's on.

"I've heard talk, I hear that boy walked out on his family," She retorted coldly "I fail to see how he can still pretend to be concerned about his father. And while we're on the topic of 'standing up for what we believe in', that's no excuse. For heaven's sake the _Death Eaters_ are standing up for what they believe in. That doesn't make it right!"

Now Oliver was furious, Dorian looked surprised and Joscelind's expression made it quite clear that Audrey had overstepped her bounds. Then they all focused on something behind her and Audrey turned.

Percy Weasley had just left the courtroom and stood facing them in the hallway they were still arguing in. He glared only at Audrey, so enraged that his body was shaking, his fists clenched. Suddenly his expression changed, as if deciding that she was nothing more than insect, he abruptly turned and stalked away.

Audrey was left shell-shocked, paralyzed from the sheer hate of that glare. She was a lawyer, so it was not the first time someone had looked at her with such loathing, but this was the first time she felt that she fully deserved it. She had no idea what possessed her to say such a thing.

"How about that. That's the first time I've ever seen Percy not bother to have a single word for anyone."

She heard Oliver say that from what felt like a distance behind her, and had no idea what that statement meant but knew somehow that it was significant, that somehow in the eyes of the world she had just become the worst person to walk the face of it. Audrey only realized after some time that she was walking and walking quickly, trying to catch up to Percy Weasley because she had to do the right thing, she had to apologize.

She turned the corner into a hallway that led to the elevator, he had heard her footsteps behind him and was walking faster.

"Mr. Weasley!" She called

He ignored her and continued walking.

"Mr. Weasley!" She quickened her pace, refusing to run.

The lift opened and he walked in. Percy Weasley stepped inside, deliberately not looking out the closing doors at her.

"Mr. Weasley, you must listen to me!" She declared in her most commanding tone.

The doors slammed shut.

The sound of her own breathing echoed in her ears for what seemed like hours as she stood there, still, in front of the lift. Finally after a time she did not know, she stepped backwards a few steps and went to lean against one of the cold walls. Audrey suddenly felt exhausted, and was unsure what on earth was happening to her today but knew somehow at this moment, she was no longer fit for human company. Yet, there human company was in the form of three Quidditch players who had apparently not left the building despite their obvious disagreement with her.

"You look terrible."

Audrey looked at Joscelind who was giving her a small smile. However, Audrey did not have the energy to even change her facial expression though she wanted to. She managed to stare at some point beyond the three of them. She needed to be alone.

Looking at each other, the three moved as one to take her shoulders and make her walk.


	4. Guilt

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

**Chapter 4**

It was a mostly silent journey on the way back to her home. They were originally going to escort her to her office (no one was allowed to travel alone anymore after all) but she begged off, not wanting to see the place for the rest of the day. Instead, she told them her address and so she was facing her door now.

The three of them were saying things that vaguely went through her mind; 'would she be okay', 'did she need anything'. She mutely shook her head at all these inquiries and noted somehow that Oliver was still disgusted at what she did in court, but still worried for her safely, Dorian was still shocked, looking suspicious of something and Joscelind was simply concerned.

Not that Audrey felt she deserved any of that concern at this point.

She was glad when they left, and practically ran into her muggle flat, shutting the door as quickly as possible and locking every lock before slowly sinking to the floor. Waves upon waves of confusing and conflicting emotions and thoughts ran through her, threatening to unleash an inner turmoil that she had worked hard on holding back for two years. Her brain was suddenly exhausted by these barrages of emotions, and was in no condition to process them properly, instead it fixated on one point: that she had failed herself and who she chose to be when she re-entered the wizarding world.

When Audrey chose to become a lawyer, she did so out of a strong love for justice. It was never just about winning, it was about ensuring that her clients were given the best representation they could possibly have. If the opposing side could not provide an equal rival, that was not her fault nor problem. When the winning streaks came, she took deliberate steps to avoid reveling in the glory, to remind herself that winning was not the important thing, justice was. Everything she did was thought out, everything planned and strategized. It also helped that the legal practice was perhaps one of the few careers one could hold in the wizarding world without magical knowledge.

When she joined the Quidditch industry, she found it fraught with scandal. If there was ever a doubt in her mind, she tried to give the case to Arcadia, who had less moral problems with these kinds of things. Of course, now Arcadia had left and she did not know the other lawyers well enough to trust them to handle most the cases that came her way. But today's grief and conflict was not borne of just being a person who wanted to win at any cost, she had intentionally hurt another human being just to save her own skin.

What had happened today? From the moment she entered that courtroom she was running off instinct and emotion only. It was completely new to her and she was reminded of why she was originally so obsessed with strategy and planning in the first place: emotions and instinct had always failed her in the past, as they failed her mother before her.

Planning so much strangely, led to a fairly lonely life but she still had friends. The few friends she had besides, were the truly good ones who understood her and she treated them like family. Audrey felt that she did not need more, they would only be shallow hangers-on.

At this moment however, her instincts and emotions were telling her that she deserved absolutely none of those friends. 'Good Heaven' she thought to herself 'What on Earth happened to me today?'


	5. Introducing Audrey

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

**Chapter 5**

The alarm clock's shrill bell earned itself a vehement 'Reducto!' the next morning. As the bits and pieces of it went flying everywhere, Audrey realized that she was nowhere near stable yet, that she was still feeling absolutely ill and drained, and finally that she was in no condition to go to work. It was a dreary Thursday morning anyway.

Groggily pulling herself out of bed, Audrey walked over to the owl cage hanging by the window and let her snowy owl out. Nike flew around the room for a bit as Audrey penned two things: her request to take leave for the day and a letter to Mr. Percy Weasley, seeking again to apologize for her words and actions the previous day.

She tied them to Nike and both went out. By the time she was finishing breakfast and reading the front page of the Daily Prophet, Nike returned with an approval of her day off. There was no response from Mr. Weasley.

At the very least she wanted some kind of response, even if it was negative, but she honestly would not have been surprised if he had tossed the letter into the fireplace the moment he saw her name. Or maybe he had not read his mail yet.

Why was it so important that he read her letter?

The answer was simple, once she knew he had, in whatever way, she was sure a lot of the black feelings churning within her would subside. Though she was capable of more activity and awareness today, Audrey's thoughts were still mulling around the confusion of the night before.

Looking in the mirror she saw only a hag. Stringy, disheveled blonde hair was everywhere, there were dark circles under her eyes and she was too pale. Her body was doing crazy things, having strange physical reactions such as unbidden tears for no real reason and despite the fact that she had forced herself to eat breakfast, she had no real appetite.

And the memories were attacking her in some disjointed way, her childhood in Geneva, her discovery: she was a witch, that she was different. At first the magic scared her, the unexplained levitations that occurred around her and the icicles that formed on the lampshade. What made things worse was that expression her mother would have on her face when she saw these things, looking at Audrey as if a nightmare had come true.

So Audrey at first tried not to do these things. But it was so hard, the magic came to her like breathing and not doing them was like choking off a part of herself. She was a freak, outcast at her school, ugly, teased by everyone for not being Swiss, and for struggling with French.

The day the Hogwarts letter arrived, Audrey read it with excitement. It was so wonderful to know that she was not alone, that she was not a freak, and that there was a place she could go to control what she did. But then her mother intervened and said "There is no safer place you Audrey, than here in Geneva."

That was the day Audrey learned about Lord Voldemort. Her mother was muggle-born, and so, her entire family fell victim to Death Eaters who had tortured them for days before letting them die. Her mother managed to escape with the help of her father who himself was just a muggle, and after years of hiding with other muggle-borns, the day finally came when Harry Potter put an end to the Dark Lord's terror. Though most the wizarding world celebrated this event, Audrey's mother moved the family to Geneva as she was unconvinced that Voldemort was really defeated by a baby.

Audrey calculated that she was seven when He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named went into his initial hiding, as it was just a few months afterwards that the family moved to Switzerland and changed their name. To this day, Audrey still had no idea what her original surname was.

She was kept ignorant of those times by careful planning on her parents' part, keeping to safehouses where she never really mixed with the other children or people, and was taught never to be seen. She knew that she was hiding from some kind of terror but her parents never explained it, thinking that to a child, the Dark Lord would be too horrifying. They were wrong, for a child, what their overactive imagination can dream up will already surpass even the most terrifying reality. Imprison a child into a situation where she has no freedom, and only hears bits and pieces from whispers here and there of things unclear but chilling, and she creates the worst nightmares on her own.

When her parents finally had the courage to tell their daughter about Lord Voldemort, Audrey was angry that she was never told before. The reality of hearing about him just as a man who learned too much dark magic was significantly less of a terror than what she used to imagine, hiding in the constant darkness. And yet, for her parents, the threat of him was enough to separate their daughter from the magical world.

Audrey was home-schooled by her mother in magic, and so never developed enough skills to become a truly good witch. She had never owned a wand that was comfortable with her as no wand ever chose her. No one could explain this phenomena in any definite way to her, and Audrey had long since stopped trying to figure it out and just accepted it. She still had her latest wand that she purchased in France on a short trip before returning to England. Though she heard of Ollivander's reputation, she had already seen five different wand makers and was not going to bother with a sixth. She could not even do proper magic anyway, a real wand would be wasted on her.

Her mother had always hoped Audrey would not inherit the magic and so was never serious about teaching her. She only learned defensive spells for emergencies and just enough to control her magic from spilling away from her. Yet, Audrey would never be a muggle. She had of course, over the years, learned the importance of secrecy and how blend in well, but eighteen years was enough of hiding herself. After graduating from her muggle high school, she returned to her native England for the first time to enroll in law school, graduated and said good-bye to the muggle world as much as she could.

Six months after her graduation from law school and her reintroduction to the wizarding world, her parents died. Her muggle father suffered a shocking and sudden death, succumbing to heart failure on the ski slopes and her mother passed soon after, not seeking magical help for her own heart condition. It was a terrible time, as Audrey had never gotten a chance to reconcile with them; they highly disapproved of her decision to live as a witch, an opinion she felt they proved strongly with their deaths as magical healing could have easily saved them. She recalled that they had attempted to write to her, but in her anger she never read the letters.

Now she never would reconcile with them. So she buried herself in her work – the only other thing of value left in her life now – and had never taken a single day's leave since.

Audrey faced the news of Voldemort's return with relief, relief that at least her mother had not lived to see her worst fear come true. Now she had no parents, and she refused to return to Switzerland. Homeless, all that was left was to best make her way through the wizarding world, swearing one thing: that she would never hide again.

The wizarding world never truly accepted her, but she spoke Quidditch well enough for them to know what she meant most the time, and she had become so used to feeling out of place in the muggle world anyway that her constant in-between state did not discomfort her too much.

Or so she thought. Now all those early feelings of alieness returned and she felt like she was thirteen again, struggling with the basics of magic while dealing with the beginning of adolescence in her muggle school, and having to hide both these worlds from each other while simultaneously living in both at the same time.

The doorbell rang, interrupting her thoughts, for which Audrey was extremely grateful. Wondering who it could possibly be, she rushed over to look through the peephole.

It was Arcadia Eris, making funny faces on the other side of her door.

Smiling, and feeling extremely relieved, for she missed her friend, Audrey opened the door to let the tiny woman in. If it had been anyone else, she'd have pretended she was not in.

"So it's true!" Arcadia declared dramatically as she came jogging in, dropping off a large box of chocolates and a few bags of muggle groceries on the table.

Audrey only looked at her in confusion.

"You! You! Ms. Workaholic taking sick leave!"

Audrey blinked "Oh…wait, how did you find out?"

In response, Arcadia pushed her to her own couch. "Lie down!" she ordered.

"But,"

"Lie down! I'll only explain everything I know to you if you lie down!"

A few blinks later Audrey decided to follow Arcadia's orders. The petite woman then continued to putz around shoving the box of chocolates into Audrey's willing hands and then began to run back and forth between the living room and the kitchen.

"Dee, what are you doing?"

"You're one of the few real friends I have in this town so I'm going to make sure that you eat chocolates AND drink chicken soup! I figure a combination magic/muggle cure ought to do it."

Audrey smiled, listening to Arcadia slaughtering various vegetables and frozen chicken with a cleaver in the kitchen with her dubious preparation skills. It tended to frustrate most wizards and witches that Audrey lived such a muggle life without many magical shortcuts.

The two women joined the world of Quidditch law at the same time and struck up an unusual friendship. Arcadia attended a magic school that was obscure for most wizards and witches from the Isles; Rhodes Wizarding College in Africa. The exact whereabouts were unknown even to Audrey, but when anyone asked, Arcadia scoffed "If you can't tell where from the absolutely obvious name of my school then there's no use my explaining it to you."

In fact, the story of how the petite English brunette, who boasted a Nereid for a great-grandmother ended up in Africa in the first place, was a mystery to all. However, Arcadia enjoyed keeping an air of secrecy about herself and this was a fine arrangement as Audrey told no one her story either. The two women respected each other's privacy about their pasts.

A few minutes later Arcadia emerged from Audrey's kitchen. "Okay, I've set that to slow boil, so don't touch it for a few hours. I figure that will give me enough time to figure out what's happening to you." Audrey was sure she would not touch the soup, especially since it seemed that Arcadia had chopped up the vegetables together with the raw chicken at the same time. Food-poisoning via contamination was not in her plans for the near future.

"Dee, I'm fine, just tired."

Arcadia ignored the statement. "Word travels fast you know, it won't be out in the papers, but every Quidditch lawyer now knows that you cleared that young Wood by throwing blame at Ministry incompetence."

Audrey shut her eyes and groaned, turning to face the back of her sofa.

"Good move! If I dare say so myself, something I'd do, but I daresay, not something that you've ever done before."

"I don't know what happened Dee."

"I believe it. Look, I found out about your leave because I'm off today from Falmouth. After the mess I decided to check back in the Puddlemere office for old times' sake and also to finalize some reports of the damages done from the last game. Then I found out you were ill, got worried and asked around. United's players have been keeping their mouths shut, but the Ministry is talking. You're not very popular at the moment Audrey."

Audrey turned from her sofa to face her friend "I'll have to deal with that then. I've blown my reputation over one case just because I lost my temper."

"What set you off?"

"I have no idea. I walked in, saw that idiot of a judge Leonis there and then Scrigmeour's little spy in the corner and I just felt this sudden anger against everything that's been happening: the return of You-Know-Who, these restrictions, everything. I guess I've kept it bottled up and I just took it out on the court."

"Scrigmeour's little spy in the corner?" Arcadia was now slipping off her heels, making herself at home. "Why is he interested in such a small case? And who did he send?"

"His junior undersecretary, Percy Weasley."

Arcadia nodded. Like Audrey, she kept up with the names and gossip of the Minister's staff. "The one they say walked out on his family. Weasley's too, that came as a shock."

Audrey frowned in confusion "Why particularly a shock for a Weasley?"

"Hm, oh yes, I suppose you wouldn't know. The Weasley's are a pure-blood family, but they're not well off like the Malfoys. They're a large family, and extremely close-knit, Gryffindor House all the way through, considered blood-traitors by some of the other pure bloods for supporting muggle born rights. They tend to stand united in everything, so this boy leaving them came as a surprise to everyone."

'A large, united, brave family. What a nice dream.' Audrey thought "I heard about him too, but I was surprised by the reality of the boy. He still seems to care about his family."

Arcadia scoffed "Well of course he does! Audrey, just because we disagree with our families and come to conflict with them doesn't mean that we shut them out completely and stop loving them." She gazed at her knowingly.

Audrey shut her eyes 'Don't think about that, don't think about it, you'll never be able to speak to mum or dad again anyway.' "I got his father into trouble." She finally muttered.

"Who told you that?"

"Oliver Wood, that new Keeper of ours was also Weasley's roommate at school. He implied that I did."

"Oliver Wood is an idiot."

Audrey raised her eyebrows as a question.

"I remember when that boy was taken in as reserve. He's got an excellent mind for Quidditch, but ask him to think of anything else and he has the intellect of a broom."

Remembering an obscure piece of drama from the previous year, Audrey smiled. "So I see you still haven't forgiven him for resisting your charms?" Arcadia had a rather terrible habit of seducing most men that she found attractive. She was never too picky either.

"It has nothing to do with that! Besides, the one I'm with now keeps things interesting."

"I'm really not interested in your sex life Dee."

"Well I need to have a good enough one for the both of us, you insist on being so boring."

"You're sleeping with a Falcon aren't you?"

"It's actually none of your business who I sleep with."

"You know it's unprofessional to sleep with the players." Audrey knew however, that few rules ever stopped her friend.

"Nevermind that, back to you. So Wood told you that Arthur Weasley would be made to take the blame for this botch up? That boy should stick to Quidditch and leave Ministry politics alone. They can't involve the Weasley patriarch in any way. He was nowhere near this Quidditch game, and there was no muggle involvement really, just six idiots who got lost. Weasley was not in charge of the wards placed around Falmouth Pitch."

Audrey felt some relief at that "That's good."

"There's something else isn't there?"

"Um."

"Go ahead, tell me, you need to get it off your chest. And take another chocolate."

Audrey did as she was told, and sat up, "I was arguing with Wood, Wadcock and Nox outside. Anyway, Wood said that I likely got Percy Weasley's Dad in trouble and I said something along the lines of how I heard that this Percy walked out on his family and had no right to pretend that he still cared about them. Of course the boy heard me and…well, I've been trying to apologize ever since. He didn't even look at me Dee, he ignored me completely. I sent him a letter today and there's not going to be a reply, I know it."

"Why does this boy's forgiveness mean so much to you?"

"I thought I just got his father in trouble, I just accused him of being an absolute bastard. I had no right to, and I need to make things right."

Arcadia tilted her head with a quizzical expression "But his father is not in trouble, and he may still care about his family's well being but he still is a bastard. Think about it Audrey, who climbs up that high in the Ministry in so short a time without being a bastard?

They both laughed at that.

"Besides," Arcadia continued "Walking out on his family, that's further proof, he is a bastard."

Audrey gave Arcadia her most freezing glare "You don't know that."

Arcadia drew herself up and met her friend's eyes with her own fierce stare "What person disowns a family like the Weasleys? In fact, what person disowns their family at all?"

"We don't know the circumstances! Sometimes when people disobey or disagree with their family, they have a damned good reason!"

"This is not about you Audrey, don't make it about you. We don't know anything about this boy, he could be an absolute monster and you're defending him."

"Who said this is about me?!"

"What kind of idiot do you take me for Audrey?!" Arcadia got up on her feet and suddenly the temperature in the room got warmer "I was there when you got the letter about your father and your mother! I was there when you were hysterically bawling your eyes out muttering 'I'll never get to explain to them, they'll never know why' over and over again. I don't want to know how you ended up here, that's your business, but if you think I could sit through that and listen to this and somehow not guess that you had a disagreement with your parents then you're a fool! Worse still, you're treating me like one! Leave Percy Weasley be and sort out your own mess first! Don't you dare use him as some tool for your own peace. You're a better person than any Ministry sycophant."

Audrey dropped her stare. She had no energy to disagree, but she supposed that Arcadia made some kind of sense.

After some quiet, Arcadia decided to break the tension "So…is he cute?"

"Excuse me?" Who on earth could she be talking about now?

"That junior assistant, is he cute?"

Audrey's eyes widened "Dee! You just said you were with someone!"

"What century are you in woman?! That doesn't mean I'm not allowed to look. And you know I like them younger. Lets see, if Percy Weasley and Oliver Wood are the same age, that means that he's only…twenty-one! Just a few years younger than us…entirely doable."

Audrey smiled a bit "I think he's a bit too much on the lean side for you. You like them…manlier."

"Ouch, goodness woman, you just accused every leanly built man of lacking manliness."

"You do that everyday."

"But that's me, you usually indulge in asexuality, that is, you don't care." That grin on her face was getting a little too large, Audrey decided.

"I wasn't really looking mind you, I had a case to work on." Besides, Arcadia had a terrible habit of using any excuse to tease her about non-existent attractions to random men.

"Of course you weren't looking, what colour are his eyes?"

"Blu-I don't know." Horror, Audrey could feel the heat creeping up her cheeks. Where was that coming from?

"You don't know that he has blue eyes. Mmhmm…"

"He was glaring at me for quite some time, it was quite difficult not to notice."

"So why say that you don't know."

"I don't know…um, because you're an annoying twat when you start doing this!"

"You don't know?"

"I don't know!"

Arcadia stood and began to prance around the room. "Long hair? Short? Wavy? I assume it's red, that's a Weasley trademark."

"I don't know."

"Oh come now Aud, that's a fairly obvious one, you tell me you don't know that and you may as well tell me that you're blind."

"My mind was preoccupied! I didn't see anything! He's not my type anyway."

"Mmhmm…how tall you reckon?"

"ARCADIA!!"

Arcadia only laughed "Hey, I distracted you didn't I? I need to get home, I have something rather hunky waiting for me there. See you!" With a popping sound, she disaspparated.

Audrey sank back in the cushions of her sofa, absently eating more chocolate. Arcadia's visits were always marked with plain ridiculousness, but she somehow always managed to make most things better. At the very least, Audrey felt some energy back in her limbs. She realized that all the crazy things happening to her body was likely attributable to stress finally catching up with her.

For now however, the good thing was that she knew what she had to do now with sudden clarity. It would not resolve everything, but then, there was no such thing as absolute resolutions in life.


	6. Percy

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

**Chapter 6**

Thursday morning Percy awoke to his usual routine. He stalked around his austere flat, changing, eating and finally flooing to work. He was fairly tired, but then again, he was always tired lately. Stress, which usually energized him and gave him a sense of achievement, was finally beginning to affect him.

His work was much the same under Scrigmeour's as it was when Fudge was Minister of Magic, except that his new boss did not waste time with words. Fudge would always give Percy praise, which he used to lap up, unused to hearing so much praise from any superior. Now a year older and wiser, Percy realized that Fudge was a fool and so was he for believing that anyone believed in him that much.

It was difficult to admit to any mistake however, as for most of his life, he never made them. Not to his knowledge anyway. His courage failed him when it came to this, because admitting that he had made this mistake meant possibly accepting too many other mistakes he had made in his life, and these were not the times for any individual to waste time wallowing in self reflection. These were times for individuals to take action, to do what they could for the betterment of their society. Once the threat of Voldemort was over, then, maybe then he'd consider taking some sort of leave and…what was he thinking?

It was a dreary Thursday morning and he was impatient to get to his office to see the falsely cheerful skies from the magical underground windows. Not that these even would help.

Percy had next to no sleep the night before, hearing again and again that cold voice say those words: "I hear that boy walked out on his family, I fail to see how he can still pretend to be concerned about his father."

Of course he knew that the Ministry was full of gossiping hyenas, and that word of his leaving was fairly well-known. It was however, one thing to know that those he knew personally would have some kind of judgment; it was another for a complete stranger to do the same.

"I fail to see…" that damned insect, how dare she? What did she know? She was only perhaps, one of the worst lawyers he'd ever seen, defending someone who was obviously innocent and winning only by using blackmail and a technicality. Of course she would fail to see anything, that stupid hag. What did she know about family? What did she know about how all Weasley's were taught to stand up for what one believed in? He believed in the Ministry, he believed in the establishment of a body that had protected the wizarding world for centuries, he believed in…

Power.

No! Stop that.

"Death Eaters are standing up for that they believe in…"

She was right really, taking a stand was one thing but there was no escape from the reality that he had made the wrong decision.

Percy was glad to arrive at his desk and see the pile of work waiting for him, hopefully it would help him to forget such troubling thoughts. As the Minister's Junior Undersecretary, Percy oversaw reports from each Head of the various departments. In addition to this, he had to assist both the Senior Undersecretary and the Minister himself. Thankfully Umbridge preferred working alone in most things, and Scrimgeour rarely ever saw Percy, deeming him not important enough. Instead what Percy received were many inter-office memos giving orders for the things that he should do for that day. His entire Wednesday was taken up by the trial, having received the memo from Scrimgeour himself to scribe it, he returned to turn in his report on its events and then could not concentrate for the rest of the day. Of course, that meant a backlog for today.

It was a good thing, work was something he was used to. He hardly socialized anymore. He used to when he started, taking occasional lunches with his ex-girlfriend Penelope Clearwater who was now working for the Comet Broomstick company, but she had taken an overseas assignment and was now in Lebanon researching the magical properties of their cedar for the next model. Percy was happy that she was far away from the danger, and that her departure gave them a good break from their somewhat awkward situation.

They broke up because the school day feelings had waned, and no longer cared for each other romantically. When he told her about what he had done to his family, Penelope nodded, clearly unhappy but said nothing, changing the subject. It became painfully clear to him then that they never really had a partnership. What they had together was a wonderful act; two intelligent people who were supposed to match each other. However on a deeper level, he knew all along that they never truly connected nor cared for each other in ways that they needed to. He thought he did though, and he felt a disappointment in himself to discover that he was only acting.

Percy clenched his fist and finally picked up his quill to get to work. He had already wasted fifteen minutes reminiscing about Penelope. This was the same problem he had the day before, it was impossible to focus.

The first topic of the day was a list of possible Death-Eater related muggle murders – as reported from the Head of the Department of Magical Accidents and Catastrophes from the desks of the Muggle-Worthy Excuse Committee. It was tough to tell whether or not there was actually a magical connection or just the work of some mad muggle who decided to wake up and kill people one day. Damn muggles had too many serial killers and other sick minded persons amongst them.

The first picture he had to look at was too full of blood and so motionless it could have been taken with a muggle camera. Percy dropped the photograph and gripped the table. He was seeing his father again, the picture of his father covered in blood after being attacked in the Department of Mysteries.

He wanted to go see him, he wanted to grab everyone by the shoulders and demand the truth! Why on earth was his father really at the Department of Mysteries? Is this what his family believed in? Percy almost made it to St. Mungos until he realized that if he went, he'd only make everything worse, he'd yell at everyone for their stupidity, and he was not prepared to do that.

Besides, at that time, he had his own career to worry about. If his entire family was going mad, then he had to stand on his own to uphold the nobility of the Weasley name and most importantly, be a correct role-model for Ron and Ginny. They were young and impressionable, but if there was just the smallest chance that they would ever see reason, then at least they'd have one brother to look to. That was until he saw them the year later, seeing that his younger siblings hated him.

"Stop that." He muttered to himself. He had just lost another half and hour of time, and those inter-office memos/orders were still flying in.

"I hear that boy walked out on his family…" there was that voice replaying in his head again. Why oh why could that woman not just disappear? Go away, insect.

As much as he tried to dismiss her though, she refused to be dismissed. Percy remembered every second of that trial, or rather, everything about Audrey Beridore. The trial had begun well enough. Percy told himself that he was likely only paying so much attention because the day before that he and Oliver discussed that very trial. At that point, Percy had no idea he'd be witnessing it. He had noted the neat, elegant, pale, honey-blonde woman walk in wearing those professional lawyer robes and that absolutely classic chignon tied at the base of her neck – it gave him a rather good view of that neck, and face and…stop. He almost blushed at Oliver's comment about introducing them. When she started speaking and before he began penning, Percy remembered thinking "Thanks Oliver, but she's out of my reach." She spoke with such clarity, calm and reason at first, presenting the facts of the case and introducing her witnesses.

Unfortunately, Percy only discovered through inter-office gossip after the trial that Madam Leonis had come in that morning after discovering that her husband had run off with a Quidditch reporter and was feeling an intense hatred for the sport at that very moment, making her a less than perfect impartial judge. Still, that was no excuse for what happened next…for Audrey Beridore to turn a perfectly respectable trial into a farce.

When that happened she changed from 'out of my reach' to 'what in Merlin's name?!'. From her accusations of Ministry incompetence to point-blank threats, Percy was forcefully reminded of his mother's early lessons of judging women by their looks alone. 'Sorry Mum, I never thought I'd ever do that. Learned my lesson now.' But he was not just being shallow. He really had thought, when she had begun to speak, that she was a goddess. Bloody lawyer.

Damn, lost another fifteen minutes, that was an entire wasted hour now!

Alright, dead muggles. This time he'd actually work. Then of course, a beautiful snowy owl landed on his desk in front of him, distracting him again. Shocked (for Percy rarely received personal mail anymore and he did not recognize this owl besides), he reached for the letter and desperately searched for some kind of a treat for the creature. He finally found a small pack of owl treats in his bottommost drawer which thankfully were not stale. After feeding her one she hooted gratefully and he broke the seal on the ribbon tied around the envelope. Odd, few people actually tied with ribbon and sealed them with wax anymore. It was quite an old-fashioned thing to do. He found that he admired the elegance of it, and that perhaps he should take the time to do start doing the same.

It held the Puddlemere United letterhead, so the first thing he read was not "Dear Mr. Weasley," it was in fact "From the Office of Audrey Beridore," and he stopped. She had some initials and whatever titles listed after her name but he did not get that far.

Glaring at the owl now who was still sitting on his desk, waiting patiently for him to finish reading the letter, Percy crumpled the parchment in front of her. Still the owl did nothing, she was still waiting.

"I'm not reading it. I thank you for making the journey but you may make it extremely clear to Ms. Beridore that I will welcome no letters from her."

'Good one Percy', he thought to himself, 'You expect owls to talk to their owners now do you?' He knew that between owner and owl they could communicate "I'm hungry, I'm in a terrible mood, and I'm happy to see you" but beyond that it was not a sure thing.

Still the owl did nothing, she simply waited. Finally Percy stood from his desk, and tossed the crumpled letter into his empty, decorative small fireplace. Nothing from the owl. He pointed his wand, flicked it and recited "Incendio!"

The owl only flew away when the letter burned into nothing. That ordeal took up another half-hour. 10:30 now and no focus in sight. Now his office smelt like smoke and it was useless to open a false window. With a sigh Percy muttered another spell to negate the smell and sank down into his chair. Staring at the ashes of what was once Ms. Beridore's letter, he felt like an absolute idiot for acting like a child. However, he knew he did not want to read or hear anything from her.


	7. Nostalgia

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

**Chapter 7**

Friday morning the snowy owl was waiting for him on his desk when he walked in.

"What now?!"

He was an idiot for talking to an owl and expecting an understandable response, that was what.

She held out her leg where he saw the familiar ribbon and seal, tied around what appeared to be an even heavier letter.

"No! I absolutely refuse! If your lady wishes to speak to me, she will have to wait until _after_ the war is over!" Which was ridiculous he knew, but just two days after meeting the woman, Percy knew it was hopeless to expect rationality from himself. 'It's just the stress' he told himself 'There's been a lot of work lately.'

The owl did not move.

"Look, I have no problem with you, but either leave and show Ms. Beridore that I have not read her letter, nor do I wish to, or I'll just burn it again."

With a disappointed and irked ruffle of feathers, the snowy owl left his office. Good riddance. As he fell into his chair a stray card that was previously buried under too many other papers fell to the floor. When Percy bent over to pick it up, he realized what it was: the invitation to Bill's wedding to Fleur Delacour. He remembered being surprised to receive it a month ago, but realized that it was just like his Mum to have snuck it in, hoping…

But he could not go and ruin the happy nuptials with his presence anyway. He looked at the date. Merlin…it was today. His eldest brother was getting married today, and he was stuck in an office, unable to think, unable to work and…and he was all alone.

All the way until lunch, Percy again found that he could not concentrate. Damn that woman, damn fate, damn doing what he believed in. Damn being wrong. But he was no Death Eater a least.

Percy decided that he actually would go to lunch for a change. Perhaps the fresh air would do him some good. He did not have to bother getting someone to come with him as most Ministry staff went to the same areas for this hour and so he found himself in a popular wizard's café.

"What will it be sir?" asked the jovial plumped faced woman behind the counter whose name he never bothered to learn.

"Uh…just…chicken soup thanks." Really what he missed was his mother's chicken soup, but he mentally kicked himself for thinking that. He'd been taking too many walks down Nostalgia Lane lately. Nostalgia, definitely nostalgia. Memory was what happened, Nostalgia meanwhile was just the reverie of what happened, the romanticism of it. He had definitely ignored the true road and walked down that overgrown path of dreams.

The chicken soup was average, but it was warm and soft, and most importantly filled an unknown cold in his stomach. At least, he felt a bit better as he smiled, paid and stood to leave.

Once outside he was met by a now all too familiar face. Why in Merlin's name was Audrey Beridore standing in front on him now? In person? Looking as neat as ever, and that damned chignon again. This could possibly be considered stalking.

He decided to ignore her again and continued walking.

"Two years ago I walked out on my family."

Percy stopped. What she said absolutely stunned him.

There was a long silence and he waited knowing now that he needed to hear what she had to say.

"I have no siblings, and my parents, they denied me the right to my magic my entire life, never told me my true name or even my past, and raised me as a muggle in a different country. I decided to finally claim my right as a witch and join the wizarding world but they vehemently objected so I just left."

Denied magic? How on earth could anyone deny a witch her magic? And a name…he assumed she was talking about her family name. He thought 'Beridore' sounded odd. Was it possible to not know one's own name?

"I sought to prove to them that the magical world held no threats, that I could be successful here. I did not speak to them from the moment I left."

Percy turned, wanting to demand why the hell this meant that she was obsessively hounding him but the look in her eyes stopped him. She was looking at him but not at him, in absolute anguish. "And I'll never get to speak to them ever again, or prove anything, because six months after I left they died."

A sharp icy feeling impaled his stomach. It was fear, pure and clear fear as Percy was forced to face the entirely possible notion that he could lose his entire family from this war, and never speak to them again. And oh Merlin, his brother was getting married right this minute. Audrey Beridore had lost her family in six months, he had left for how long now? Almost a year and a half.

They just stood there after that, Percy no longer cared about the time. Bill was getting married, Bill almost died a few months before at Hogwarts, his father almost died the previous year. In his sixth year Ginny almost died. Those feelings of despair washed over him as he remembered how it felt to hear that Ginny, baby Ginny, their little Ginny was in the Chamber of Secrets, what it felt like to feel helpless. He was so self-absorbed he could not even protect his baby sister. Well now that changed hadn't it? He was in the Ministry, working to protect Ginny and all magical citizens. Was that really what it was about when he first left?

_He_ could die in this war. He'd never be able to…to what? Tell them that he loved them even with what everyone had done? He was never good at just pure expression like that, he needed to lecture in order to prove that he cared.

What were they waiting for? Why was he standing on a now empty street staring at this woman who was also lost in her own world down on Nostalgia Lane?

"My brother," he broke the silence "Is getting married today."

"Congratulations." She nodded. Was that a tiny smile?

Percy shrugged. He was at a complete loss for words. He opened his mouth but shut it, realizing that for the first time in a very long time, he had no idea what to say.

"I'll be going then. I'm sorry for the letters, I just needed to…tell you that. I don't know why, but I assure you, from now on, you'll hear nothing from me."

Despite what he had been feeling for the past two days, Percy was not entirely happy to hear that. Instead of expressing it however, he just nodded dumbly.

Smiling slightly, Audrey held out her hand. Percy took it and they shook, as he held her hand he looked at her eyes, realizing with a start that she was tall, almost his height. He dropped his eyes as soon as they released each other and she walked into the café where he saw her ask to use their fireplace to floo. Percy stood still, watching until he saw her disappear in the green flames. Then he finally made his slow walk back to work. He knew that he was late, and for the first time, he did not really care.


	8. Coup

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 8

When he returned, instead of going directly to his office as usual, Percy went downstairs to the Ministry's Hall of Records. Within the Hall was row upon row of fist sized magical orbs which contained the basic personal statistics of every magical being born on the British Isles. The orbs zapped into existence on their own when a new citizen was born, maintained the changing information on its own and turned a dull brown from their vibrant red on their own accord when someone died. Archivists under the employ of the Department of Mysteries maintained the Hall, moving brown orbs to an archives room, cleaning up and performing general checks to see that everything was working properly.

The Hall of Records was restricted against almost everyone, protected by large heavy doors that could only be opened by magical means from the inside, and only to those whose personal magical signature was recognized. Percy himself was only granted permission to access it when he was promoted under Fudge. Fudge, as Minister of Magic, granted himself unlimited access to any information about each magical citizen in the Isles. This meant that only the Head Archivist and Minister of Magic had immediate access to reading any of the records. Percy would take the orbs and report the essential details that Fudge wanted to know by taking notes as the Archivist recited the information to him, or bring the entire record itself to Fudge's office, then return them later. Scrimgeour also kept access to the Hall, though he rarely asked Percy to retrieve information for him.

Percy had never before abused his right to access the Hall, and was not intending to do so for malicious reasons. He was only going to discover a name. A true name, and would not look at anything else. He would never see Audrey Beridore again, he was sure, but he appreciated what she said to him, it awakened a courage in him that he had forgotten about, pushed him a step farther in facing his family, and he wanted to repay her somehow.

He could let her know her true name. She could continue her life from there and he could continue sorting out his.

"Mr. Weasley." Percy heard as soon as he walked through the doors. He turned to greet Master Clio; the Hall's head archivist. Master Clio was a crinkly old man who lived in the Hall, treating each orb like his own child. In a way, he was the father to everyone's details, living and dead…until he himself would pass on anyway. The doors closed with a heavy thud.

"Good day Master Clio."

"Who are they looking for this time?"

"Ah…there's a name but it's not the real one."

"Oh?"

"The first name may be real but the family surname was changed." Percy tried to sound as businesslike as possible.

"Well, give me the current known name and whatever else you know. Perhaps a physical description?"

"The name is Audrey Beridore. Profession: Puddlemere United lawyer. Age: Um…around mine most likely. Hair: Blonde, Eyes: Hazel."

"Aah yes." Master Clio nodded.

Percy tilted his head, curious as to why Master Clio thought it was entirely expected that he'd be here searching for her name.

"That firebrand that raised hell in that courtroom on Wednesday yes?"

Percy had to nod. Apparently that trial was of some kind of importance that he was not aware of. He'd have to further look into that.

"Give me a moment to find her based off that information."

Master Clio raised his wrinkly hands in the air, circled his wand in a pattern that Percy did not know but recognized from earlier times he had come to the Hall, and muttered mutely. About twenty red orbs flew to the Archivist, and with a lazy wave of his wand they began to circle him. Peering carefully at each one, Master Clio finally reached out and grabbed one.

"Now that was easier than I thought it would be. Shall we check and make sure we got the right one?"

He gently tapped the top of the orb in his hand and a small image appeared from the top. It was simply a small Audrey walking. Percy presumed she was still on her journey to her office.

"That's the one. Thank you Master Clio."

"No problem Mr. Weasley, just make sure as usual, that you let your Minister know that the orb must be returned before the end of the day." He gave the orb to Percy.

"Actually Master Clio, I just need to retrieve one piece of information from this orb, I don't need to take it anywhere."

"Oh, in that case then, what do you need?" Master Clio infinitely preferred the times when Percy just needed some bits to jot down instead of the entire sphere.

"Just the name she was born with and the names of her parents."

Master Clio nodded and raised his wand to extract the essential information.

A deafening roar reverberated through the walls, followed by a series of explosions. The Hall shook and Percy fell hard to the ground, remembering to clutch Audrey's record protectively to ensure that he did not drop it.

"What was that?!" He heard some other archivist yell from farther back in the room.

The sound of blasts continued, it was impossible to stand up straight, so strong were the vibrations that was shaking the floor.

"Quickly! Protect the records!" Mr. Clio snapped at his staff. The archivists all suddenly scurried to activate the shield charms surrounding the shelves. Percy hid Audrey's record in the inside of his robes during the confusion to protect it. It sounded like the Ministry was under attack.

'But that's impossible!' Percy thought as he jerkily got to his feet 'the Ministry has defenses that are impossible to break through in the just the short hour that has passed between lunch and now.'

Unless…

He helped an archivist to her feet.

Unless there were already enemies working on the inside.

'But no…we've been so stringent with security.'

Another loud blast, then he heard screams through a crack that appeared in the walls. Agonizing screams. Percy's first thought was of his father, 'need to get to Father, need to…' but then he realized his father would be off today for Bill's wedding. Thank goodness for small acts of fate.

The blasts were getting closer and the room was vibrating even more. It finally hit Percy with a stunning clarity: The Hall of Records, they were trying to break into the Hall of Records. He had no idea what attack spell was strong enough to distort the Hall's security charms enough to get through, but the enemies on the other side obviously did. It was obvious that despite the desperate efforts of those guarding the door, the Hall was being broken through.

An archivist was crying in front of the doors, in shock and doing nothing.

"You!" Percy ordered, giving some kind of command to get that person moving out of the way. The archivist barely noticed. Percy ran forwards as best he could with the vibrations and grabbed him. Turning the man around, Percy jumped as hard as he could with him, landing the both of them into a crumpled heap.

It happened just in time as right then, the doors to the Hall blasted inwards, completely crushing the six who guarded the door underneath their weight. There were sinister bone crunching sounds joined with the muffled screams coming from under the heavy metal.

'Merlin,' Percy thought in horror 'They're still alive. Some of them are still alive, they're slowly getting crushed to death.'

The man was clinging to him, crying, gazing at the blasted doors in disbelief.

"What's your name?" Percy demanded, trying to get the archivist to return to reality.

The man slowly turned, gazing at him with wide, fearful eyes 'Thomas…Thomas Yeats."

Percy nodded "Come on Thomas, get to your feet, you need to be ready to run just in case."

The vibrating had stopped, and as the dust cleared, six death eaters walked atop the fallen metal, the screams underneath grew as the five added their additional weight.

Percy whipped out his wand, ready to find some way to free those trapped, though he had no idea if their lives could be saved at this point, but Thomas grabbed the back of his robes and held him back.

"What is it?! Let me go!" Damn it all, if he was going to die today, he'd die in glory, give his family something to be proud of for a change.

Thomas wrapped his arms around Percy's wand arm, shaking his head in the negative. "Mr. Weasley, look."

That was the thing about the red hair and the gossip, Percy was shocked at the amount of people who knew who he was. He turned to see what Thomas was indicating.

Master Clio was running forward, wand out to protect his charges. "How dare you enter here!"

The six death eaters threw stunning spells at the Head Archivist but Percy had shaken his arms free from Thomas and cast a Shield Charm the same time the Master cast his own. It was enough to deflect the strongest of them, but Percy was one strong wizard against six stronger ones, and Master Clio's strength lay only in the magic he had used to organize his precious orbs over the decades. The death eaters released another onslaught, this time Percy had run to the fore, along with several other archivists, doing battle.

'We have to win this.' Percy thought 'There's so many of us and just six of them, no matter how strong they are.'

Suddenly one death eater was standing in front of them, holding Thomas Yeates by the neck 'How did that happen?! Did he not run?!' But what stopped everyone was the face that mocked them when that death eater pulled back his mask. It was Pius Thicknesse, Head of the Department of Magical Law Enforcement, Percy would never have suspected – but that was the point he supposed. 'I'm a fool, an absolute fool!' Unless, unless Thicknesse was under the Imperius curse. Yes, that was most likely why the large Death Eater behind him was carefully aiming his wand at Thicknesse's back.

"There's been a change in leadership here." Thicknesse declared "I'm the new Minister of Magic, as Rufus has just retired."

No.

No, this was a nightmare, it had to be, it could not be real. Percy raised his wand

"I would not do that if I were you Mr. Weasley." The new Minister pushed his wand into Thomas' neck.

Percy made a split second decision, expecting no one to guess that he'd actually continue, he finished his swish, "Levicorpus!" Hah, after years of reading files covering everything from cauldron bottoms and muggle attacks, he knew this spell, he learned this from the report he had to write on the incident at the Quidditch World Cup.

The six death eaters and Thomas rose into the air, temporarily unsteadied, but before Percy could follow through with 'Immobilous' as he originally planned, to keep them paralyzed in mid-air, he heard "Petrificus Totalus!" from behind and he fell.

He fell with a terrible crash, wand thankfully still in hand but he could do nothing now. It was an archivist, damn, of course there were traitors in this room, how else could the defenses been penetrated so easily? It appeared that there were traitors everywhere.

The archivists had started dueling and fighting amongst each other suddenly, unsure of who to trust. Others were huddled in a corner, crying and a select few were actually still trying to care for the orbs.

The death eaters gently landed, having been helped down by the female archivist that Percy had helped to her feet earlier. Bitch. Thomas was left floating helplessly in mid-air.

Ignoring the fighting around him, Thicknesse approached Percy with a raised eyebrow. "We'll have to spare you Mr. Weasley. You are a pure-blood after all, despite the fact that you come from a family of blood traitors."

Percy glared, unable to say anything.

"But still, your personal conduct regarding your family this past year and a half has proved at least that you have set yourself apart from them. Perhaps this entire battle then is just a misunderstanding between us. You think I'm a traitor to the Ministry?"

From what Percy could hear, the traitors were winning, the Hall was lost. "Mr. Weasley, I am the new Minister of Magic, therefore I am the Ministry, and I have every right under the law to access every record in this Hall. I intend to lead the Wizarding World into a new age, an age where Wizards will take their rightful place as leaders over all other beings. With our powers, we have a responsibility to take the lead." Thicknesse paused before he barked "Master Clio!"

Clio was forcefully shoved on his knees by two of the traitor archivists. Thicknesse moved to stand before him. "Let me prove to you Master, that I am indeed the new Minister, and that I have the right to access these records."

Raising his wand, Thicknesse muttered "Solicitus Record…Name: Thomas Yeats, Hair: Brown, Height..." He paused, then gazed at the floating figure "I'd estimate 175 cm." Thicknesse waved Thomas closer and the struggling body came. Staring intently at Thomas' face, Thicknesse finally finished with "Distinguishing mark: thin horizontal scar right below the left eye." A red orb came flying to his hand.

Thomas looked even more pathetic now from his helpless place in mid-air. It was true, no orb answered unless it was Master Clio himself or the Minister of Magic. Except of course if the law was changed again, but that would not happen now. With a few whispered words and a tap, Thomas' record opened and a miniature image of him dangling in mid-air floated above the top opening of the orb. A light shone in front of Thicknesse's eyes, providing only him every listed detail about Thomas' life the record could give.

Thomas was crying again, and Percy was still immobilized. He could do nothing as the horror was playing out before him.

"Thomas Seth Yeats, you were born in London to Albert and Sophie Yeats. Your father is a carpenter and your mother a nurse. Both are muggles." The death eaters began to snigger.

"You attended Hogwarts, graduating five years ago, you were in Ravenclaw House." Thicknesse paused. "Admirable house, Ravenclaw. Intelligent students there. My own House actually. Tell me Thomas, do you think you know what is going to happen to you in just a few moments?"

Still drifting helplessly in mid-air, Thomas opened his mouth, but courage failed him and his eyes only opened wider, his body shaking in fear and tears.

"No answer." Thicknesse gritted his teeth. "Pathetic. Pathetic! Just like your muggle parents! You filthy mudblood! You and your kind should never have been allowed to join our ranks! AVADA KEDAVRA!"

A bright flash of green and Thomas Yeates' record turned a dull brown. Thomas' body still floated, limp in the air and Percy could only stare in shock. He had placed Thomas up there when he used 'Levicorpus' on the group. He had made it that much easier for them to kill him.

"Did you see that Mr. Weasley? Of course you did. Let this be a lesson then. The Ministry still needs good, pure-blooded, young, strong wizards like you to serve it. You are still a Ministry employee, as are all current employees, and I believe that you, especially you are loyal to this Ministry. However, I will be watching you Percy. You and every other pureblood I have working with me. For every indiscretion, the cost will be one muggle or a muggle-born. Thomas is the example for your first mistake, of defying me. Thomas is the example also for the other pure-bloods in this room."

The screams from under the heavy doors had long since died. Thicknesse walked down a shelf to gaze lovingly at the orbs. "Now that the Hall is mine, discovery of all muggle-born wizards and witches will be a reality. Then we'll really be able to get to work."

Percy felt two pairs of strong arms lift him, one holding his head, the other his feet. He was being carried outside and a brief state of panic settled within him as he wondered where they were taking him. It turned out they were only taking him to the lift. They threw his still body into the elevator and sent it to the lobby.


	9. Trying Times

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 9

Percy's immobilized body was dragged out of the lift when it opened at the lobby by people whom he assumed were more Ministry traitors (judging by the gleeful looks on their faces). He knew they would not kill him, he was a pure blood. He was surprised that they did not further harm him, but was grateful that they considered him inconsequential.

A few minutes later he could move again. Walking quickly, he made his way to a fireplace to floo home. No one stopped him, as no one stopped the other Ministry employees allowed to leave alive that day. Everyone was pale, scurrying as fast as they could.

Once home Percy collapsed. Shakes enveloped his body but he did not cry. The shock of everything that had just happened was tearing through him, and the hopelessness of it all hit him. He could not stop going to work, he had to continue to find a way to protect the remaining muggle-borns. The new regime would also target those mixed with non-human blood. Percy needed a way to protect them as well. He could not contact his family, if he did, someone else would die. But it was too large a job to do on his own. He'd have to find others who'd be willing to help him, but who?

Glancing around before reaching into his robes, he pulled out the fist sized red orb that was Audrey Beridore's record. Percy was amazed that it had survived the onslaught of everything. He knew that the records were hardy and fairly indestructible, but there was a lot of rough treatment today. For all intensive purposes from now on, Audrey Beridore did not exist in the Ministry registries. Unfortunately, her orb in his hand made her a non-entity and a non-citizen, where she would remain until the record was back on the shelf in the Hall. Also, it seemed that someone was looking for her, otherwise why would Master Clio have known about her? He had to find her, somehow without getting anyone suspicious. If anyone found out that she was missing in the Hall, there would be serious consequences. Audrey had to go into hiding. She and a lot of others would have to go into hiding. The old days unfortunately, were back upon them.

How to reach her though? He only had one opening: Oliver Wood. Oliver would know how to contact Audrey. Percy needed to discover some way of communicating with Oliver Wood without raising any alarms on the Quidditch player. He was sure that his old roommate would help, they were not close friends but seven years of living together provided an understanding of each other's character; it was in Oliver's nature to do the right thing. There was the answer to his first question of who would help him protect the others; Oliver, one helper would not be enough but it was a start. They did not know each other very well before but Percy knew he could trust the man. Besides, the group he needed to form had to be kept small, it had to be kept a secret.

Though Percy knew that after all his mistakes he likely had lost the right to define what was 'right' and 'wrong', if protecting muggles and muggle-borns was not the right thing to do in this time, Percy had no idea what was.

Leaning against his fireplace, Percy sighed. He had always tried his best to be good, to do right. He tried to be a good son, a good brother, and a good man. He had failed in each of these categories. Now was not the time to try, now was the time to act, and it no longer mattered what others thought of him, only that he succeeded in this next task he knew he had to do. These were going to be trying times.


	10. Hiding

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 10

Practice was particularly grueling this day. It was a fairly bright Friday as compared to the dreary Thursday they had the day before. Oliver was playing with intense focus, even more than his usual, feeling somehow the need to prove himself again after the entire mess with the charges and trial. He had not seen Audrey since, but Dorian had told him that this was normal: the lawyers did not usually mix with the players too much unless they were needed.

Dorian was distracted today anyway, making absolutely horrible throws and missing easy goals. The chaser was being yelled at but Oliver knew that off days simply happened, terrible though they were. Landing on the pitch and making his way to the locker rooms for the final team talk, Oliver was trying his best to continue his life and career the best he could. He was not happy with how Audrey had won that trial and cleared his name officially, but he had to accept that this was the best he was going to get. He was taken off reserve just a few months ago after Puddlemere's previous Keeper retired to start a family and there was no room for mistakes or controversy. He was grateful that his parents were vacationing in the Caribbean. After years of supporting their son, they deserved a much needed holiday, and so he scrapped together his savings to buy them the tickets for their cruise.

"What a day huh?" It was Joscelind again. Oliver smiled, she was an excellent team captain and he knew that she was checking up on him.

"Yeah but I think we made some good time today, a bit worried about Dorian though."

Joscelind's face showed concern and she opened her mouth to respond when the loud voice of Philbert Deverill, United's manager was heard yelling out in the locker room. Looking at each other briefly, both ran back out to see what the fuss was about.

"There's been a coup in the Ministry!" The gathered Quidditch players all blanched in shock as their manager delivered the news.

"What?!" Oliver demanded.

"It's true. They say that Rufus Scrimgeour has retired but he'll likely be dead before tonight is out. Pius Thicknesse is the new Minister and this affects us because," Deverill held out an official looking piece of parchment "Quidditch and all other sport and activities have been cancelled indefinitely."

It seemed to Oliver that the world had imploded. He was not seeing, feeling nor really breathing. They had cancelled Quidditch. They had actually done it those fools. But wait, a coup? Scrimgeour dead? He snapped out of it just in time to hear Joscelind demand more information from their manager.

Deverill was speaking in hushed tones now "It's too recent to know, but the rumours say that Pius Thicknesse is with the Death Eaters. No one knows what is going to happen now. I need all of you to return to your homes and stay safe. When this is over and we can finally resume play."

The other Quidditch players quickly dispersed, racing home to check on friends and family, but Dorian, Oliver and Joscelind, the team's only single players stayed to milk more information out of Deverill, but he had told all he knew.

"Go home and protect yourself Joscelind, I need you alive when we're allowed to resume play. If it's true and You-Know-Who is really in charge now, it's going to be tough on muggle-borns." Deverill turned to leave, apparently concerned enough to give a warning to the team's most famous and best player but not brave enough to offer any help in protection. Joscelind was Puddlemere's only muggle-born player.

Her face adopted a look of fury. Dorian sought to calm her "Jos, you can't go home, you live there alone and it's not safe. You're too much of a celebrity, there's no way no one has missed the fact that you're muggle-born."

"No! Look, this is all fear off speculation! We don't know what's really happening. We're assuming off rumours that Thicknesse is acting with the Death Eaters, that this will lead to some kind of…muggle genocide. There are no facts!"

Oliver decided to take action "And there will be no facts until we go somewhere and listen to the radio or something, we can't just deny it. Look Joscelind, humor us, spend the next few nights at my place, Dorian, you too. We should stick together and it's getting late."

To his surprise, both senior players nodded in agreement with him. Oliver looked at the two of them in their simple after-practice robes and their sports duffel bags. They were so unprepared.

The three of them apparated to Oliver's flat. Immediately afterwards Oliver ran to his radio and turned in on.

"…there is nothing to fear, my magical brethren…" It was Pius Thicknesse's voice

"Under my leadership we will continue to thrive and come into our destinies, free to use and live with our magic as we wish. We will no longer need to hide from the muggles nor fear their wrath, we will be free."

"My God," Joscelind swore "It's true then."

"In order to squash these absolutely baseless and ridiculous rumours regarding the Dark Lord and his followers, the name 'Voldemort' is from now on tabooed. Any who have the audacity to speak his name will face serious consequences. My magical brothers and sisters, I look forward to…"

"Oliver turn that damn thing off! We've heard enough!" Dorian yelled. Oliver quickly followed the Chaser's orders. Joscelind sank down onto Oliver's sofa, staring wide eyed at the radio, still trying to digest what she had just heard.

"Oliver!" Dorian called. Oliver turned to face what Dorian was indicating, a thin silvery whisp flew into his flat from under his door and formed into a patronus of a hawk which settled on the arm of the sofa. It spoke "Oliver," with Percy's voice "I need your help, you know my address, please apparate here, I have something urgent to discuss with you." The hawk faded.

Joscelind stared mutely at the space the patronus had occupied before it disappeared "Who was that?" she asked.

"Percy. You both saw him at the trial." Oliver answered.

"The one Audrey was making a fuss about." Dorian angrily added. "Listen Oliver, it could be a trap, he's with the Ministry isn't he? If he's on the good side why is he still alive and well in his flat?"

"Maybe he's not well," Oliver argued "Maybe that's why he's asking for help."

"We can't be sure." Joscelind argued, "Oliver, send your patronus back, ask him to apparate here. At least that way we won't have to split up and if he's planning any tricks he'll have to face the three of us."

Oliver nodded and immediately followed her orders, thankful that he at least had a competent Defence Against the Dark Arts Professor in the form of Professor Lupin his final year. It was the only reason why he could complete such an advanced spell.

As Oliver's bullmastiff patronus ran off, he turned to look at his teammates. They had become closer in the past week just because of the mess with the hooligans, and now it appeared they would be stuck together for much longer just for being singles. Dorian still looked angry, and Joscelind looked extremely irritated at Dorian.

"Dorian honestly, it was funny before but if you're going to let your crush on Audrey Beridore affect your thinking now I'm going to hex you so bad you'll never fly again!"

"That's not it Jos."

"What?!" Oliver exclaimed, completely missing the 'pop' that sounded behind him "Dorian fancies Audrey Beridore?!" Then he noticed that both Joscelind and Dorian were standing, wands out facing someone behind him.

Oliver turned, seeing Percy standing with his hands up, wand in his robes and looking extremely worse for wear. His face and neck were covered in bruises, it appeared he was in quite the fight.

"Okay, um, Joscelind, Dorian, it's Percy, you can put your wands down."

"He could be someone else." Joscelind responded.

"Or acting under the Imperius." Added Dorian. Percy spared a dry glance at him.

"Oh for Merlin's sake fine!" Oliver exclaimed, turning to Percy he asked "After winning the Quidditch Cup I returned to our dorm with…?"

Percy smirked "You managed, between winning and the start of the party in some way I still do not know, to smuggle three bottles of firewhiskey into our room and the two of us being the only male Gryffindor seventh years available to celebrate got thoroughly smashed. You managed to get out into the common room to join the rest of the party, and I had to vomit. And no, I didn't bother stopping that party."

"Right. Well Percy, good to see you, I see you got my message to come here. These are my teammates Joscelind Wadcock and Dorian Nox, I believe you met saw them on Wednesday. We're holing up here until things…calm down a bit, especially seeing as how we're all temporarily out of a job now that Quidditch has been cancelled."

"That really all you can think of right now Oliver? Still Quidditch? This is beyond Quidditch Oliver!" Percy moved closer to the three, Joscelind had put her wand away but Dorian was still tense. The redhead spoke softer "It was wiser of you actually to suggest I meet you here. The Apparation office can't track where we go, and patronus communication is one of the most dependable and secure means left. They will be checking owl post now and monitoring all the Floo-networks. Besides, I'm sure I'm being watched, I left the lights out in my flat from the moment I arrived home after work, they likely think I've collapsed. They were right."

"Percy." Oliver put a hand on his former roomate's shoulder and sat him down on the sofa next to Joscelind. "What happened today? We've only heard rumours." Percy looked at his teammates "You can trust everyone here Percy."

Percy looked at the three of them, grit his teeth in determination and spoke in a soft voice. Leaving out the reason why he was in the Hall of Records in the first place, he told them everything: that Death Eaters and therefore the Dark Lord had indeed taken over the Ministry. He had realized after returning home that Thicknesse was most likely under the Imperius curse, being controlled by one of the other Death Eaters who he had seen. Percy also explained to them the nature of the Hall of Records, the murder of Thomas Yeats, the muggleborn Ravenclaw, as an example, and of how Thicknesse was going to collect the names of all the muggle borns Britain and Ireland. Percy finished this last with a look at Joscelind.

That left them all in silence.

"So…why come to me?" Oliver asked.

"Because I need help Oliver, I can't go to my family or they'll kill someone else, I can't trust anyone at the Ministry because I don't know who's on what side, they're going to be watching me very closely, and I definitely need someone I can trust to help me hide the muggle-borns."

Oliver's eyes grew large at the enormity of the task, but he nodded, knowing somehow it had to be done.

"I also need your help to find Audrey Beridore."

"Audrey's a half-blood, don't tell me the Ministry's also going to kill half-bloods as well." Dorian sneered.

"Audrey's father was a muggle and her mother was a witch yes, but a muggle-born one. That's really pushing the line." Joscelind added.

"This isn't about her blood status." Percy sighed. "Look, it's about the fact that as of right now, she's a non-citizen and in fact a non-entity in the Isles. Once that's discovered, that could cause some problems."

"What?!" Dorian fell back trying to figure out how what he heard was possible. "The Hall of Records, was her record destroyed during the battle?"

"I need to discuss that with Ms. Beridore alone." Percy responded with a shadow of his pompous tone, "You do understand that the business of her record is for her only. I happen to know it just because I was at the place at the time."

The two men glared at each other for a time until Joscelind finally stood and whacked them both in the back of the heads, "Enough boys! I don't want to even smell testosterone until this mess is over and we have the time to fight over these things!"

"I can find Audrey." Oliver declared, breaking the tension. "But I think that it'd be a bad idea for us to split up too much. Percy, I think you should come with me, we can side-along apparate, that way you can…say what you need to say as quickly as possible. Dorian and Joscelind, hold the fort here. Joscelind, no one should know you're here. Be careful around the windows." Dorian looked like he was about to object but Oliver gave him a look that silenced him. "Stay with Joscelind Dorian, you're better at most spells than me you bloody Ravenclaw. You're better able to conceal her."

"Oliver," it was Percy again, "This isn't just about talking to her, she has to go into hiding. We need to identify safehouses to hide the muggle-borns."

"Safehouses…" Joscelind stared at the floor, looking very sick. Dorian sat next to her on the sofa and put a reassuring arm around her shoulders. He remembered the safehouses and fear from childhood too.

"Anyway, you're right Oliver, we need to stop wasting time here, we need to find Audrey. Maybe we can get her to come here and with an extra head we can plan from there." Percy and Oliver stood.

"She lives in a muggle area Percy, so we'll have to be careful who sees us."

Percy nodded. Oliver told him the location and they both disappeared with a pop.


	11. On the Run

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 11

Audrey stepped out of the fireplace that led to the lobby of Puddlemere headquarters. It was a terribly official name for the office building that housed the team's administrative workers, lawyers and marketing department. She had taken the half-day leave in the morning to seek out Percy Weasley because she was sure as soon as she had sent Nike off that he would not read her letter. She was glad to have caught him outside the Ministry's most popular lunchtime location and have told him what she needed to say.

Now that those words that she had told no one else in the Isles were out and off her shoulders, she felt considerably better, but there was still something else bothering her, constricting her chest and making it sometimes hard to feel like she was getting in full gulps of air. Audrey dismissed the feeling, attributing it to the physical stress her body had undergone lately due to her emotional upheaval.

Having made her way to her office, she set her papers down and got to work, examining the information from her last case, seeking to understand what exactly it was about that trial that bothered her. Scrimgeour's interest was what made it all so suspicious, even without the terrible job that Magical Law Enforcement did. Once she discovered the connection she needed, she could work on regaining the respectability to her name, besides, the other cases on her desk were inconsequential and she could handle them fairly easily and quickly.

Information from the Ministry was of course, difficult to come by, so she had to rely on non-existent eye-witness accounts. It finally occurred to Audrey that what bothered her was not the Law Enforcement's absolute incompetence, but the fact that the incompetence exhibited had to be intentional. Pushing back a stray lock of hair behind her ear, Audrey began to brainstorm the situation.

Six muggles lost in Falmouth. That meant that not one but six fully aware people had all decided to completely ignore all their instincts that must have been telling them to stay away from the area that they were approaching. The information on the muggles was severely lacking, there was nothing to say if the six even knew each other. Audrey frowned at the wizarding world's blatant disregard for the other world. Magical beings considered muggles so inconsequential sometimes that they left themselves completely bereft of certain essential information. She wrote a note to herself to further investigate using her muggle connections to discover who exactly these people were.

A man perfectly dressed for a crime had attacked these six wanderers. The coincidence was simply too much to be ignored. In that case, why not attack the muggles with magical means? It was so much simpler to hex them all with a wand than to single-handedly take on six muggles with a single, rather short bludger bat. No matter what wizards and witches thought of the helplessness of muggles, one against six was plain stupid odds in a regular fight.

Wait…were the six actually muggles? Audrey had been acting upon the urgency of the six having been muggles due to publicity concerns and because all the reports said so but what if…

She picked up the handset of her telephone (she was the only one whose office had and needed a connection) and dialed the number of the muggle hospital that was currently taking care of the six injured. Audrey was connected to the nurse whom she had spoken to a few days earlier.

"I'm sorry to bother you again Nurse Reed, I just wanted to check on their well-being."

"Oh that's very kind of you Ms. Beridore. So far only one has been conscious and somewhat aware and even then she makes no sense. Then again, she has suffered serious trauma to her head."

Audrey picked up her quill in the anticipation "What has she been saying if I may ask?"

"Just gibberish really, something about watching a game called Quidditch in a place called Falmouth. Don't believe such a game exists unless it's one of those crazy new ones, and I've certainly never heard of that town. Mostly we keep her sedated."

She scribbled excitedly on her parchment "And there's been no luck in identifying these people?"

"None at all. No one has come for them and the amnesia does not help."

'Amnesia' Audrey mentally scoffed. At least it appeared one of the victims recalled the events of that day.

"I know this sounds odd Nurse Reed, but if your talking Jane Doe wakes up again, would you mind taking down her words and calling me to let me know what they are? I know it's gibberish but there may be something in that gibberish that will help me in my case against the perpetrator."

"Well alright, I'll see if she wakes up again anytime soon. Thank you for calling."

Audrey put the handset down. The six victims were definitely not muggles though they were confirmed unmagical by the St. Mungo's on-call mediwitch. They were squibs. That explained at least how they were able to ignore the wards, why they would be watching Quidditch, but did not explain the attack. She supposed she could attribute the weak defense they put up to the fact that squibs were often brought up ashamed of their non-magical abilities and taught to overly fear and respect their magical counterparts. Such an attitude would force six otherwise strong people to stand by helplessly…against a magical attack anyway. Audrey was sure that no matter how helpless one believed himself or herself to be, that person would still instinctually put up a good defense with five other people against one bat. Especially considering the consequences.

Okay so, six attacked squibs and the Ministry ensured that their memories were erased. At least, they tried to. Oliver was simply a convenient scapegoat, he was foolish enough to have gone into the crowd. Now why would Magical Law Enforcement want these six squibs incapacitated and then suffer a complete loss of memory? It had to be something obvious otherwise the Ministry would not have been so fearful of letting this incident get out. There was something obvious someone could figure from this situation.

The phone rang, Audrey picked it up after the first ring.

"Hello?"

"Hello Ms. Beridore. I have this script for you. The best we could make out was 'United Falcon game at Falmouth but' then it gets really garbled and I couldn't make out anything, and she suddenly starts yelling 'thickness' again and again. We've been trying to calm her.'"

Audrey blinked "Thickness?"

"Yes, I told you it was gibberish, oh," Audrey heard another voice talking to Nurse Reed "Please hold on Ms. Beridore." She waited, thinking 'thickness, thickness...' her eyes widened as she put the name together "Thicknesse!" she hissed.

"That's impossible! They were perfectly stable!" Audrey heard the nurse's voice over the line, the conversation leaking over to her ears. "Oh my God Ms. Beridore!" Nurse Reed's voice came back over the line. "I have to go! The six patients are all going into cardiac arrest!"

The line went dead and Audrey loosely held the receiver in her hand as she stared at the wall in front of her trying to put her thoughts together. 'Pius Thicknesse…I must be mistaken, but it's the only thing that makes sense. He's the Head of Magical Law Enforcement and someone among that group of squibs knew something he did not want getting out, or saw something he did not want getting out. It definitely was not the one who was speaking but then…why would he attack squibs with a bat? And why were six squibs together in an alley with the Head of Magical Law Enforcement?' This was only becoming more and more bizarre. Worse still, the six were dying, if not already dead.

Fear gripped Audrey as she registered the last fact: the six squibs were being murdered at this moment just for having seen Thicknesse, there was no way that six perfectly healthy people at different stages and ages of life could all simultaneously have a heart attack just as one was starting to remember something. This case was that serious, and after the ruckus she made in the Ministry there was no way she'd be overlooked. They'd find out that she was talking to Nurse Reed, and then they'd come after her.

She looked around quickly, making sure that no one and nothing was watching. Audrey kept her office as muggle as possible to confuse the average magical onlooker. The disorientation it caused usually protected her but now she was unsure. There were so many things that magic was capable of that she would never have the skills to counter. Pulling open her bottom right drawer Audrey stared at the single item that sat in it: a muggle book The Art of War that she never actually got the chance to read but that she kept because it suited the image of her office so well. No one, if they checked would think anything odd of their muggle-raised lawyer reading such a book and then reserving an entire drawer for it.

Audrey grasped the book and held on as the whirlwind came and dropped her directly into her flat. The Art of War was her emergency portkey that she had asked Arcadia to illegally create. She was thankful that her friend's magic was enchanting items.

After growing up in a paranoid household, some habits were hard to break and Audrey was glad that she kept an emergency exit. Old habits also meant that she had an emergency pack waiting for her in the disguise of an ordinary backpack under her bed. But now what? Years of this fear gave her the instinct to have an escape plan but now she was in her flat and she had her pack what was she going to do? As Audrey absently changed into muggle clothing to blend into the crowd, she realized that she had no place to run to and anyway, she had sworn to herself that she would never hide again. She hated the idea of it but she knew that to just stay in her flat would be absolute folly.

Arcadia had given her two things after Audrey's parents died; the portkey in her office and a decorative gemstone-tree that she had brought back from Africa. The latter was a second illegal emergency portkey directly to her friend's flat should she ever need help in a crisis. After setting Nike free from her cage, Audrey was happy that her friend never cared much for rules and touched the small rose agate tree.

She fell in a heap on Arcadia's living room floor and looked up to see a very naked, very well built, and very large man's body staring at her in confusion. As her eyes traveled from his toes and slowly up his form, they widened in appreciation. Then she stopped at the face and gagged. Unfortunately this godly body possessed the ugliest face she had ever seen. He looked like a troll!

"Audrey?!" Arcadia came running from her bedroom in a light night robe. She looked at Audrey's state and noticed the gem-tree in her hand.

"Gods," she swore, "Come on!" She helped Audrey to her feet "Marcus! Don't just stand there like a statue, get some clothes on and then help me!" He ran off to the direction of the bedroom.

"Damn Dee." Audrey softly laughed "Don't you go to work anymore? And…have you gone blind? Have you seen his face?!"

"Don't judge a book by its cover." Arcadia snapped, "And of course I see his face, why do you think I don't allow that man to wear clothes in my flat? Now tell me what's happened? Can you stay here?"

"I should be able to stop by briefly, there's nothing in my flat to indicate I'm here. But I don't want to endanger you so I shouldn't stay long."

"Nonsense, absolute nonsense. You're not doing this alone, whatever it is."

"Going up against a traitor in the Ministry who happens to be the Head of Magical Law Enforcement? He's already killed the six squibs from Falmouth."

"Squibs? I thought they were muggles."

"Squibs, and at least one recognized him. I think that's why Scrimgeour was interested in the case, he must have suspected Pius Thicknesse of something."

"Go to Scrimgeour then! You can convince him!"

Audrey thought about that, she could do that. She dreaded the idea of begging a favour from Percy Weasley to set up an appointment between her and the Minister but once she explained the case, she was sure even Weasley would help her. "Dee, can we trust…him?" Indicating Marcus of the godly body and hideous face in the bedroom.

Arcadia looked at her with dead seriousness before whispering "Absolutely not, but we'll have to work with that somehow as he already knows that you're here. Keep him close." Audrey nodded.

The man called Marcus came running back out, unfortunately quite dressed, hiding his better qualities and leaving only his least desirable face visible.

He opened his mouth as if to say something but turned quickly to the window. Arcadia followed his gaze, frowned and went to it. There was an owl waiting outside. Audrey sank as much as she could, afraid of being seen, noting Marcus cast a quizzical look at her behavior. Arcadia turned, reading the parchment, and going a bit pale.

She looked at Audrey and then Marcus before breaking the news "There's been a change of leadership in the Ministry, Pius Thicknesse is the new Minister and Quidditch has been cancelled indefinitely."

Audrey felt her jaw drop before she could stop it, Thicknesse the new Minister meant that Scrimgeour was dead. Marcus blinked once and quickly strode over to Arcadia's radio and turned it on.

"My magical brothers and sisters," they heard Thicknesse's voice "I look forward to bringing us all into a new era of magical freedom…" and they listened in silence to the new Minister's plans for magical supremacy, and the taboo put on Voldemort's name. They stood still and listened for a very long time before Marcus finally turned the radio off.

"We know what we need to know." He said. "The Dark Lord rules over us now."

Her mother's worse nightmare come true. Audrey closed her eyes, then looked at Marcus. He was taking the news so calmly and when he said 'The Dark Lord', it was with respect and some awe. This was not good.

Looking at Arcadia, she saw that her friend was also not entirely pleased with what she heard but there was a tiny smile on her face. 'She knows him better than I do' Audrey thought 'There's something she likes in what she heard, she's either delusional or there's hope for him yet.' If only Percy Weasley was so easily readable.

"Marcus," Arcadia quietly called, wand out, features now steely. "Choose now."

He turned and simply gazed at the petite woman. Audrey looked at the both of them, the two seemed to have forgotten that she was there. It was quite the image; Arcadia who was lithe, voluptuous, small, short and stunning with her waist-length, wavy dark brown hair, pale skin and sea-blue eyes facing down her latest toy who towered over her by almost two heads, ugly and stocky.

The silence stretched out for what seemed like forever, when Marcus finally, slowly and deliberately fingered his wand, pulled it out and pointed it at Arcadia, smiling all the while. Audrey grabbed her wand, ready to fight.


	12. Get us out of here

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 12

Oliver and Percy apparated into the emergency staircase of Audrey's apartment building. Taking care to stay silent, they opened the door into the hallway and quickly retreated inside and shut it. They knew how to recognize fellow wizards and witches and there were too many in the hall wearing Ministry law enforcement black, facing an open flat door.

"That's Audrey's place." Oliver whispered.

Percy risked a glimpse out the window on the emergency door to try and figure out if Audrey was in any trouble but he saw only disappointed faces.

"There's not really a fuss. Those five are standing outside the door, all looking like they couldn't get what they came here for." Percy whispered back.

Percy ducked and Oliver took a brief look. "You're right, if Audrey was in or they had caught her, there'd definitely be more action going on around here."

They both pressed their ears against the door to listen instead of risking looking and being seen. They could not hear words but footsteps were good indicators of activity.

"If she's not here," Percy started "Where could she be? You think she's somehow already gone into hiding?"

"She's an efficient person but that'd be a bit too fast Percy. The only way she could have gone this quickly is if she knew they were after her."

Percy nodded. He had not expected to run into Law Enforcement here, and anyway what did they want Audrey for? Had they already discovered that her record was missing? That was unlikely. If that was the case he'd have been apprehended before he even got around to sending Oliver his message. They were after her for another reason and the only thing he could think of was Oliver's trial. So why go after the lawyer then and not Oliver, Joscelind Wadcock or Dorian Nox as a priority? If they were going to do that, there was no way Percy and Oliver would have left in any peace, the three Quidditch players would have been arrested before even receiving Percy's message.

"Maybe she did." Was all Percy responded.

The thundering sound of footsteps interrupted Percy's thoughts. Risking another brief glance he saw Law Enforcement leaving, all looking extremely angry and thwarted. Percy felt a smile form on his lips for Audrey Beridore.

"Come on Oliver."

"What now?"

"Maybe if we look around her flat we'll have some clue of where she went." Though he felt some apprehension at invading her space, Percy did not see any alternative.

Cautiously they left their hiding place. Wands out, they silently creeped down the hallway, all the while making sure that no one from the Ministry was left. Once at the door, they were shocked to discover that it opened to a simple 'Alohomora'. They walked in, shut the door and took a look around at the disaster Law Enforcement left behind.

The place was turned upside down, cushions ripped, vases and statues broken, drawers pulled out, books thrown off the bookshelves and chaos left everywhere.

"I guess they didn't find what they were looking for." Oliver observed as he softly tread over the floor.

"I don't think they had any idea where to look." Percy agreed "This flat is so…well, muggle."

Despite growing up with his muggle obsessed father, this was the first time Percy had ever been into a purely muggle abode. In fact, it purposely teased any magical person with the false promise of magic. Percy looked at the wizard style wooden clock that was thrown to the floor. He turned it and saw the battery. There was one picture on the fireplace mantelpiece of a witch in robes, holding a wand but she stood absolutely still. Percy assumed from the woman's appearance that this was Audrey's late mother, but in a still muggle photograph there was a false look to her, like she was a muggle woman playing dress up for Halloween. There was a harp in the corner, thrown down, strings cut, and Percy did not have to go near it to know that no charms or enchantments had ever touched it. The instrument did not sing unless someone strummed it with their own hands.

A broomstick was left carelessly in the corner and Percy saw Oliver pick it up. "Nothing." Oliver said, "Just a normal broomstick used for sweeping."

"There's dust caught in the bristles Oliver."

Oliver looked at the dirty head. "It's almost wrong to see a broom actually used for cleaning. Merlin, couldn't she use cleaning spells? The amount of time this must have taken up, doing everything by hand."

"I think that was the point Oliver. Being a muggle has been her best defense for her entire life. She just couldn't stop."

The idea of Audrey having cleaned and created every inch of this home with her own hands over hours of time, only to have it thrashed it so casually made Percy clench his fists. How had he been deluded for so long as to the nature of the organization he believed in?

"Looks like it worked, being a muggle I mean. Magical Enforcement had no idea what to do with this place, how to search it." Oliver put the broom back in its place and stood thinking.

"Well then, lets try to think like Muggles. Where could Audrey have gone to if she'd known the Ministry was after her? Oliver, do you know who her friends are?"

Oliver thought for a few moments "She gets along fine with Joscelind and endures Dorian but I think her best friend is another lawyer. Her name is Arcadia Eris but she left Puddlemere for Falmouth a month ago. As for where she could have gone…it's possible she went to Arcadia, but Audrey also has a reputation for solo acts. It's also entirely possible she just disappeared into the muggle world again. Think about it, would anyone know how to find her?"

"The Ministry has been known to work with muggles before. Thicknesse may talk muggle domination to us but if he felt like he really needed to get Audrey, he could have muggle authorities hunting her down as well, just as Fudge did with Sirius Black." Percy sighed "I guess we'll have to try our luck with Ms. Eris. Do you know where she lives?"

Oliver looked horrified at the idea.

"She's that popular huh?"

"No it's just, she tried to seduce me once, Arcadia, it was quite terrifying."

"You? Terrified of someone?" Percy smiled at the thought of what this woman must be like. Oliver was not even afraid of Professor McGonagall at school.

"Don't get me wrong, she's gorgeous, and I was mad for turning her down, but I had my career to think about and sleeping with one of our lawyers didn't seem like a good idea at the time."

Percy did not bother to comment. He knew he had no right to criticize anyone who got too wound up in their job. Besides, there had to be something else about this woman that scared Oliver.

"So you don't know where she lives. Where would I keep my best friend's address if I were a muggle?" Percy mused.

"If she's a best friend I wouldn't need to keep it anywhere, I'd remember it or call her." Oliver lifted what looked like a foldable muggle television.

"You would. I spoke briefly to Audrey and she strikes me as a fairly organized person who likes to note things down."

Oliver grinned "Well that explains why you're suddenly such an expert on our enigma lawyer. When did you speak to Audrey?" He put the thing down. Percy looked at it for a moment, wondering why he was feeling a tug at his memory.

"That's it Oliver!"

"What?"

"That thing you were holding! It's a pomcuter!"

"A what?!"

"Muggles use it to store information and communicate. I've seen my Dad tinker with one before, come on, let's see if we can turn it on!"

Percy rushed over while Oliver bent down. After a few minutes of stupid mistakes "Maybe spelling 'on' with these keys on this flat thing with the disorganized alphabet will do it." They finally found the dubious half-circle button with a line partially going through and pushed it "Honestly, who one earth could look at that and associate that sign with turning a bloody thing on? Crazy muggles."

As they waited for the thing to stop singing that it was indeed on, Percy frowned and asked "Oliver aren't you a half-blood?"

"My parents are both half-bloods but they don't exactly do a lot of things muggle anymore, my family, I was raised in a fully magical world."

"Right well, I was hoping that now perhaps you'd know where to look for any of this information."

The logic working did not take long as soon as they found that that touching the flat square on the bottom flap of the thing moved an arrow on the screen. Then they found the image that said 'Address Book'. Amazingly, they found Arcadia's address without too much fuss after that.

"Hm, I wonder why she didn't bother to I don't know, protect that or something." Oliver mused.

"She probably figured that no wizard would even know how to look for a pomcuter, much less how to use it. She's mostly right, even the employees at the Muggle department can't figure out half the things that come their way. We were already feeling unsettled just by standing here in an environment so lacking in magic after magic tampered with it. We only saw some of the signs. I'm sure Law Enforcement got it worse, walking into a place quite so…still."

"Sometime when there's time I need to tell you how strange it felt to sit in her office for the first time. You think her home is bad, her office is downright worse. Absolutely nothing to indicate someone alive, much less magical is there. I mean it's one thing for a muggle or a squib to live like this, but someone who knows magic to choose to live this way? It's odd. Still damned condescending of her though, looking down upon us magical folks and thinking that we can't put things together."

"Oliver, that's exactly how we treat muggles." Percy took one last lookaround Audrey Beridore's flat. "Anyway, we'd better get moving."

They apparated to the address they memorized off the pomcuter and found themselves back in a more familiar magical territory in Falmouth. Looking at each other briefly, Percy indicated that Oliver should knock. 'Makes more sense,' Percy thought 'She could try to seduce him again and we could go inside.'

Oliver knocked.

No response.

Oliver knocked again.

Again no response.

Percy was getting worried. If Arcadia Eris was also missing that meant that the trail to Audrey was at a dead end. While he was sure that Audrey Beridore was entirely capable of taking care of herself, he still felt uneasy at the thought of her alone out there.

"Ms. Eris?" Oliver called through the door "It's Oliver Wood from United."

Percy heard a blast from the inside. The door opened suddenly and to his shock, Percy recognized Marcus Flint as he reached out a hand, grabbed Oliver by the neck and roughly pulled him inside. Percy took the opportunity to run in, almost tacking the extremely large man but Flint shoved him off and slammed Oliver against the wall.

"IS THIS WHAT I GET?!" Marcus was bellowing, his head turned towards the living room as the flat door slammed shut. Oliver took the distraction as an opportunity to deliver a hard punch to Marcus' face. Flint's grip loosened, releasing Oliver and before he could deliver another blow, a small woman had run up to embrace Flint from behind, holding him back or just simply holding him. Percy could not tell.

"I don't know why he's here!" She was yelling. "Stop it Marcus!"

Percy desperately tried to take in the situation, the extremely beautiful petite woman having the strength to hold back Marcus Flint was something short of amazing.

"I just gave you my wand! My wand woman! Do you know what that means?!" Flint was bellowing "I can't believe you thought I'd turn on you! For what?! You think I'm a death eater? That's so boring and bloody unoriginal! Woman you've seen me! Where do you possibly think I could hide a dark mark from you?! How do you know him?! How does he even know where you live?!"

Wait…Marcus was sleeping with this woman? She had to be Arcadia Eris. Damnation, was she blind?! It seemed a great injustice to the world that someone like Marcus Flint, cheat and bastard could win himself anyone like her – she was certainly not the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, but there seemed to be this mist of charisma that surrounded her.

The unlikely pair were suddenly embracing each other in a passionate kiss. Percy looked at Oliver in confusion. The Keeper just shrugged, looking amazed, utterly confused and somewhat disgusted.

"Percy Weasley?" A soft voice broke Percy from his shock and he turned to see Audrey Beridore standing up from her hiding place behind a sofa. At last. He closed the distance between them before he knew it and almost took her into a hug. Percy stopped himself at the very last moment, leaving them awkwardly close. Instead he just looked at her. She looked tired but determined, dressed in muggle clothing, hair tied in a ponytail with a messenger bag slung over a shoulder. She was also clutching her wand.

"Ms. Beridore, Oliver and I have been looking all over for you."

She ignored that, instead taking a step back and looking him up and down. "What happened to you?"

Percy realized that he was still in the same clothes he was wearing in the Hall and still covered in bruises. He could have said more but all he managed to get out was "I'll tell you later."

Audrey nodded, then tilted her head to one side to note Oliver still sitting on the floor in the corner by the door. He waved somewhat cheerfully, considering he still had that disturbed look on his face for being just a few feet away from the still kissing couple.

"I'm starting to feel quite alone and unloved here, so maybe if we could all figure out just what the hell is going on, maybe we can get somewhere!" Oliver shouted.

Percy laughed and from the corner of his eye he saw Audrey smile in some mirth. Marcus and Arcadia had decided to stop for air but still stood clinging to each other.

"How did you find me?" Audrey demanded as she took a few more steps back from Percy.

"You left Arcadia's address on your pomcuter." Percy explained quickly. He was wondering why she felt a need to retreat from him.

"My…what?" She appeared genuinely confused.

Percy blushed, knowing he must have made a mistake with the name. "Your…you know that thing that muggles use to store information, pomcuter."

Audrey gave him a sympathetic smile "You mean my computer? You knew how to access that?" She suddenly looked worried.

"It took us a while, but don't worry, magical law enforcement has already been at your place, they didn't find anything."

"What?" Arcadia had broken away from Marcus, though still stood near him "They really are after you."

Audrey shrugged in response. She was about to say something when an urgent knock sounded at the door.

"Magical Law Enforcement! Open this door!" They heard a woman's voice yell from the hallway.

Percy, Oliver and Audrey quickly ran to find a place to hide. Arcadia ran over to them and opened a decorative trunk in her living room. "Climb in." She ordered.

"All three of us?!" Oliver questioned incredulously. Percy looked inside, it was about to be a terribly tight fit even with an enlargement charm on the inside. They were all fairly tall, not to mention Oliver's burly frame.

"You have a better idea?" Arcadia demanded. "I'm going to shrink this trunk once you're all inside and put it on the table, that way it'll look like an ornament."

The knocks came even more persistently. Audrey looked disgusted at something but climbed into the trunk. Percy looked at Oliver rather hopelessly then joined her. He settled into a scrunched seated position beside her and when Oliver joined them they were absolutely squished.

Before Arcadia closed the lid they heard her hissing at Marcus "Your clothes! Take them off! Take them all off now!" Then the lid slam shut, hiding them in darkness.

Percy was grateful even when the odd shrinking sensation began and ended with a jostle like they were being moved. He was grateful that it was dark so no one noticed he was blushing. How on earth was today still Friday? It started off so normally like any other day.

"Well officers, what is it?" They heard Arcadia demand in an irritated tone.

"Get out of the way!" A woman's voice.

"Hey!" Arcadia again.

Percy listened to the sound of multiple feet confidently striding into the flat, then stopping. An awkward silence reigned in the room.

"Well hello, feel like joining the party?" Came Marcus' smug voice.

"Uh…" Female law enforcement again. Percy realized what had happened, thank Merlin he was inside a box if Marcus Flint was standing stark naked outside facing the entire Law Enforcement squad. He felt Audrey shifting on his right, shaking with barely controlled laughter. Oliver was just still.

"Because you know, if you're going to interrupt me and my woman, it had better be for a damn good reason." There was some contented laughter from both Arcadia and Marcus.

"Er, ah, well Ms. Eris." The spokeswoman was trying and failing to maintain her authority. "We would like to ask you if you've seen Ms. Audrey Beridore recently."

Arcadia took some time to answer, but they heard a satisfied moan from Marcus and Audrey was shaking even more. Percy thought maybe the situation was perhaps funny, if he was not quite so terrified for the blonde woman's sake. This was a pretty desperate plan on Arcadia's part.

"I saw her yesterday," she drawled huskily "She was ill." The tone abruptly changed to one of concern "Why? Is something wrong? Has something happened to her?"

"As of now Ms. Beridore is a fugitive and if you receive any information about the whereabouts you are to report it to Magical Law Enforcement. We'll be checking up on you Ms. Eris."

They heard footsteps trudge out as fast as possible, then the door closed. Audrey was now gasping for breath, needing it desperately after holding in her laughter for that long, Percy felt Oliver let out a long held-in breath in relief. Still they patiently waited to be enlarged again and released from their cramped hiding place.

They continued waiting, wondering what was the matter, but when they heard sounds of passion coming from outside, Audrey finally yelled "GET US THE BLOODY HELL OUT OF HERE!!!"

Percy looked at her in shock. He certainly did not expect that kind of tone to come from the prim looking lawyer. He was somewhat relieved actually, she was actually human and he could now imagine succeeding in stringing along a sentence to her.

Arcadia was laughing somewhat nervously as Percy felt the strange sensation of being enlarged and finally the top was opened.

"Thank the Gods you finally decided to let us go!" Audrey yelled at her friend as she climbed out of the trunk. She was the first to jump out of there.

"Sorry." Arcadia sheepishly replied. Her hair was tussled, her cheeks flushed and her robe obviously just retied. Flint was sitting on the sofa using a cushion to cover his groin.

"And you!" Audrey turned on him "Go put on your clothes!" Marcus did not move.

Arcadia turned and raised an eyebrow at him. "Marcus." That was all she needed to say and Flint stood up to follow her orders with a surly look.

Audrey meanwhile was hastily retying her hair and looking around for a quick escape. She turned to the four of them finally with a blazing look in her eyes. "Apparently I'm in really deep trouble and I don't fully know why. It isn't safe for you Dee, I'm going, I'm leaving now."

Percy ran to her and grabbed her arm just in case she knew how to disapparate "Wait!" Audrey looked at him, and he felt the full weight of glare upon him. But she did not pull her arm away.

"Look Ms. Beridore,"

"For Gods sake! Call me Audrey."

"Audrey, this has been an odd day for all of us, really. But there's something that happened at the Ministry that directly affects you that I need to talk to you about. It has grave possible consequences and you have to go into hiding."

Her eyes widened, first in fear, then in anger. She never raised her voice, but she actually leaned forward and almost whispered to him in a deep, determined tone "I'm never going to hide again."

Percy's voice was stuck in his throat, he did not know what to say, he just stared at her, caught in her glare.

"STUPEFY!"

The curse caught Audrey unaware and she fell unconscious suddenly into his arms.

"Sorry about that." Arcadia ran up to him. It was she who threw the curse. "But you'd never have gotten her to come along without and besides, she's been so worked up lately I'm afraid she'd do something quite unwise if she went out alone again."

Percy nodded, picking her up awkwardly. He noticed Arcadia slip something into Audrey's pocket, but said nothing, just noting it.

Arcadia did not notice, instead turning and Percy saw Oliver and Flint glaring at each other with barely controlled disgust. Years of intense school rivalry spilled over into the present. Percy knew that it certainly did not help that Flint probably still thought that his 'woman' had slept with Oliver at some point. Yet, he could not help but wonder why Flint was even here, he did not play professional Quidditch. In fact, his profession was a mystery.

"Boys." Arcadia grumbled. "Right well Percy, you make sure they behave, and I'm going to change." She pranced off.

"What the hell is going on?" Marcus coolly demanded suddenly.

"We should ask you Flint." Oliver fired back "Last time I checked, you were on their side."

Flint laughed "I'm on no one's side Wood, just my own."

Percy scoffed "You're going to stand there and tell us that you're not happy Vol-You-Know-Who has taken over?"

Flint relaxed on the sofa, fully clothed again and there was that familiar expression of trollish cunning on his face. "I admit that I admire the Dark Lord. Against all the odds he's managed to return, and return so momentously. But," he turned to look at the direction Arcadia went off in "the Death Eaters are so…organized, established and boring, just like the damn Ministry. They're probably happy to be working together. Besides, I have a pureblood name, I'm as safe as I need to be. It looks like life can be more interesting hanging around here, at least until it gets boring or tiring. Then I'll see where else there is to go."

Oliver raised an eyebrow "And Arcadia's going to want to keep you around?"

Flint's expression hardened "Got a problem with that Wood?"

"Not at all Flint, not interested in your woman, as she already knows."

Before Flint could fully stand to demand an answer Arcadia came prancing out of her bedroom dressed in fairly average attire and carrying a bag. Percy noted she dressed to blend in. In fact they all were. The only problem would be Audrey in her muggle clothes but maybe there could be a plan for that.

"So where are we going?" Arcadia demanded of him. Percy balked slightly, then wondered why he was shocked at being taken as some kind of authority – had he not spent most his life trying to be and being in a position of authority? The truth of the matter was that the last time he actually was a leader was when he was Head Boy. The rest of the years he was a sycophant. He had to regain footing on this leadership thing.

"Well," Percy looked down at the unconscious Audrey. "Oliver, do you think she'd be safe with you? I mean, she knows you." Oliver nodded. "And Arcadia, don't you think it's safer for you to stay here? Are you a pureblood?"

"After a fashion, I have a pureblood name from a different country. But then, my great-grandmother is a Nereid. I'm not entirely sure where that makes me stand. And Marcus, well, that's obvious, you were all at school together I gather."

"They'll be after the muggle-borns first" Percy responded "Flint's well connected and Arcadia, well, you can pass as long as your great-grandmother is not common knowledge. You also studied overseas right?"

"Rhodes Wizarding College. Was born overseas too, my mother's English."

Percy smiled, appreciating the department he started his career in. "Africa. Well, that means your paperwork is in a jumbled mess in the Department of International Magical Cooperation's files room. They're not looking there now." 'And you don't have an orb in the Hall of Records for not having been born here.' He thought. "So you can stay here, relatively safe. Keep alert, we'll communicate via patronus. You can send anything to Oliver's address. Do you know it?"

She shook her head in the negative and Flint's expression softened somewhat. "Then send it to mine." He didn't want too many people knowing where Oliver lived after all. Percy leaned in to whisper his address to Arcadia, Flint only laughed at the obvious distrust.

"Alright then." Percy concluded. He looked at Oliver who nodded back. They apparated with Audrey back to Joscelind and Dorian.


	13. A little sharing time

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 13

The two chasers rushed to Percy to check on Audrey.

"What happened?" Joscelind asked.

"Is she alright?" Dorian demanded.

"She's fine." Percy wearily placed Audrey down on Oliver's sofa. "She's been on the run since this afternoon I gather and she wasn't willing to sit still so Arcadia knocked her out."

"Arcadia?" Joscelind took out her wand. "Think it's safe to revive her then?"

Percy pursed his lips. "Be prepared to hold her down, she's not going to be happy."

"She's never happy." Dorian grumbled in the background.

Joscelind muttered the words to wake Audrey up. She sat up with a start and took an urgent look around, calming when she recognized everyone she saw.

"Percy? Where am I now? What happened to me? Where's Arcadia?" She demanded. He was discovering that it was very difficult not to look into those hazel eyes.

"Oliver's flat. It's safe, they're not watching him really, Arcadia and Flint are still at her place, its safe. I need to talk to you privately."

"You left her alone with that troll?" She demanded. Percy had to appreciate her judgment of people.

"It appears that she was in charge of the situation." He responded rather stiffly. It did seem the best solution at the time. "Besides, I'm not comfortable with the idea of him here."

Audrey sat up with her head in her hands before looking at him with a determined expression. It was almost like there was no one else in the room. "I don't trust him, and because I don't trust him, I want him right where I can watch him. He's a large man, and she's a small woman. He may have surrendered his wand to her but there are so many opportunities despite that for him to overpower her."

Oliver stepped between them "But still, it appears that Flint and Arcadia have an…understanding of a sort. He won't harm her now, and I suspect, she has a pretty good read of him to predict him. I don't think she'll let him know my address." He grinned rather hopefully. "And anyway Audrey, Percy does have something to talk to you about."

Her head tilted, he guessed she was remembering his words before getting knocked out at Arcadia's.

"Use my bedroom. We'll wait out here" Oliver led them to it. As she stepped inside, Oliver turned and gave Percy a grin. Percy almost snarled at Oliver, he really was not making this any easier. 'Honestly, we could have had this talk in the kitchen or something.' But it was too late now.

Closing the door behind him, Percy stood right by it and looked at Audrey. She was waiting for him to speak. Why was it that he could never stop talking usually, but around her he could never find the words?

"Heh, to think today began fairly normally." Well alright, that's an average start.

She smiled, that was good. "I know, can you believe that about nine hours ago we saw each other during your lunch hour?"

Percy let out an exhausted sigh and rubbed his face with his hands. "Seems like an eternity ago already, yet the time somehow passed by so quickly."

"You didn't find me to talk about the time Percy." He was pretty sure that was the first time she called him by just his first name alone. Despite her somewhat exasperated tone, he found warmth in the fact that he was on a first name basis with her. Percy then reached into his robes and pulled out the fist sized, fiery red orb that was her record.

"What's that?" She came closer and he gave it to her.

"Your record." Holding up the orb she raised an inquisitive eyebrow. With a deep breath Percy found himself explaining what the Hall of Records was and the battle that happened within it earlier that day.

"What?" She blinked, shocked, looking at her orb with new eyes.

"I wasn't going to invade your privacy or anything like that!" He hastily added. "I just went down there to see if I could discover your true name for you, then I would have left it."

Audrey just looked at him with wide eyes. He wished that she would stop doing that, it was hard to concentrate when he saw those eyes. "Not that Percy, everything that happened, they attacked you, you're still covered in bruises and you've been running around since that fight?" She lectured, then she finally registered the important part for him "And…my name?" She whispered.

"You told me that your parents denied you your name. Our conversation, gave me the idea, um, courage to talk to my family again. Well, I can't do that now but at the time it was a good thought. I thought I'd find out your name, give it to you as thanks and then we could both continue…trying to live our lives." Percy wanted to hit himself for sounding like such an idiot.

Audrey looked from him to the orb to him again, staying silent, yet her expression urged him to continue.

"We can't open the orb Audrey, the only ones with access to it are the Head Archivist and the Minister. The thing that prompted me to find you was the fact that during the battle, I ended up keeping your record with me and so, I apologize, I'm truly sorry but…as of right now, because this record is not in the Hall, you are a non-citizen and a non-entity in the British Isles. You have no rights here and they can do anything they want to you. That's why I said you have to go into hiding."

She listened to his words calmly, but when he said "non-citizen" and "non-entity" she began to shake. Audrey was shaking with such rage that Percy tried to put a hand on her shoulders but she flinched away. Looking at him suddenly her rage disappeared, and her expression softened. Then she just looked sad.

"I'm sorry!" He exclaimed "I was only trying to help, and then I was only trying to protect it! I thought when I first realized that that your record was with me, was that it missing from the Hall would mean that they wouldn't know that you exist and so you'd be safer but now…now they're hunting for you and I've just made it worse! I'm sorry!"

It was terrible, Percy felt like he was five again and he was so scared he could not stop shaking, but the shaking only made everything worse because his parents were distraught to see him so, and the little ones could not understand. It was like being trapped in a box, no action could be right, everything just pointed to some wrong.

He realized he had fallen to sit on the floor. He was exhausted, it had just been such a long day, the worst day of his life in fact. Percy suddenly registered a slender arm coming to rest on his shoulders, and another arm awkwardly embracing him.

She said nothing to him, just holding him until he felt comfortable again.

Percy uncurled. He was not going to do this; put this woman's life in danger and then put her into the uncomfortable position of having to mother him for his stupidity too.

"It really is okay Percy." She muttered softly to him. He looked at her in confusion. How could this possibly be okay?

Audrey gave him a forced smile "My father was a muggle. I have a muggle English passport. I have rights, I just need to leave the magical world to claim them. It's just that I don't want to do that." He was sure there was something that she was not telling him.

"Look Percy. I've spent my entire life in hiding, and returning here was my chance to finally escape that. I gave up my family just to be free and paid a terrible consequence for it. I don't want to go back into hiding, so please don't make me. I'll just leave if you try." She gave him that steely look again and he recognized a familiar unmovable stubbornness in her expression. He'd seen it too many times on the faces of his family and most likely wore it himself quite often as well. There would be no use arguing with her now, he knew.

"Alright, no hiding." Percy agreed, and she did look taken aback at his easy answer. "What are you planning to do then? You're on the run now, do you even know why? You told me that your family denied you your magic, how will you defend yourself? Yet, you refuse to return to the muggle world to hide. The options seem low."

"I'm not completely hopeless at magic. I'm damn good at transfiguration and warding, I can do some charms, defensive spells in theory. My patronus is average, but I'm sure I can think of a very happy memory for the next one." Audrey smiled at that last bit. She was awfully close. As soon as Percy realized that he started to feel awkward again. He recalled never feeling quite this nervous around Penelope.

"As for why I'm on the run…" She was looking at him "Its old news now. I found out that Scrimgeour was suspicious of Thicknesse and was investigating him. That's why you were scribing at the trial I gather. I found out that it was Thicknesse who likely attacked the six victims who, by the way, were squibs not muggles. I know that Thicknesse had the six squibs killed in the muggle hospital because I was on the phone with the nurse when they were dying. Soon after that I started to run, and just in time it seems, if they're already looking for me. The plan I admit was to just keep running, and on the way figure out what's going on. Right now I can't think of a place to start. What about you Percy? In this new Ministry, this new world, what are you going to do now?"

"Fight for the world that this is supposed to be." Well that sounded pompous. "I mean I, I lost everything I believed in today and it would be nice to have a proper Ministry – one that can actually serve our community." He realized that he wanted her to know everything, including the things in his life that he had never told anyone before, and he wanted to know all about her as well. What was it that Oliver had called her earlier? The enigma lawyer. Did he really already know more than anyone else here? Surely not more than Arcadia.

Audrey was staying silent, he realized that she was giving him a chance to tell her his story, in fact, he was kind of begging for it with an opening like that.

"When you caught me at the end of my lunch hour, what you told me." Percy was afraid to ask, "How many people know that you well, were denied…how many people know what you told me?"

Audrey looked away, looked at Oliver's bed, then turned again to face his closet, and her body stiffened. Percy was about to apologize, take back his question but before he could, she responded, "I don't like people knowing a lot about my past. You're the only person I've told anything personal about my family to." She turned to face him again "Understand I never meant for that to be burden on you, I'm sorry for what its caused, I told you because I felt I needed to and because I was sure I'd never have to see you again."

Percy was unsure how to take her last sentence but smiled anyway, hoping that there'd be some reassurance in it and took a deep breath. "Nothing to apologize for, I should apologize for being so rude to you beforehand." How to make this sound natural and not needy? "I owe you a story then, in exchange for what you told me. If you don't want to hear it of course, you don't have to."

"Don't be silly, I'm still listening aren't I?"

Finally, he sighed, a chance for relief. "I haven't told anyone this, because it's so hard to admit that I was an absolute fool. All my life I knew I wanted to work for the Ministry, to serve, to lead. It seemed a natural progression, I mean, I was so used to being the responsible older brother who, closest in age to the rest, should have been able to connect better. Bill – my oldest brother – was usually the third parent, he'd guide, listen, and even if he disapproved he'd still support you however he could. Charlie was the fun older brother who'd start all the games and do all these daring stunts and I, well, I was the brother who scolded, lectured, and ensured that at least some rules stayed followed. We're a large family, there are seven of us kids, and my Mum and Dad always had their hands full with all of us. So in a way, that's where the division was, three older brothers, Bill, Charlie and I, who were in charge of taking care of the younger ones: my twin brothers Fred and George, Ron and my baby sister Ginny."

Percy found himself smiling as he remembered his family, before the bitterness returned.

Audrey had a wistful look on her face, she was looking at him kindly. "And then of course," he continued "I left them. I've always believed in the Ministry, I believed in the system because well, it seemed to work. My life ambition was to become Minister for Magic someday, and I had worked so hard to make that dream come true. The Ministry was so structured, so organized and I craved that in my life. The Burrow – my family's home – is by nature so chaotic! It really looked to me like such organization could maintain our world and save it from anything, I thought that very sanity could serve as a good model for my younger siblings as well. I received a promotion after Fudge denied You-Know-Who's return after I made a stupid mistake about my last boss. I thought I'd be fired but instead, I was made Junior Undersecretary. I came home to my family boasting about it, thinking that they'd be proud of me because they all knew my dream. Instead my father accused me of being an idiot for believing Fudge and implied that I was given the position so I could spy on my family and not on my own merit. I responded with unkind words of my own, I yelled at my father for his lack of ambition and too many other things and walked out. I should have realized then that he was stressed, he was dealing with the reality of You-Know-Who's return and protecting all of us. Instead, I just thought of myself and my own pride, and went to the ones who fed me what I wanted to hear. I've always had this…fear of becoming my father, and so, I sold my soul for praise. So at least you left for a good reason, you left to claim yourself. I just left for the sake of my ego." Percy felt the weight lifted from him, finally being able to tell someone these words.

"Percy," she laughed "Thanks for telling me this, and just to let you know, we lawyers know that ego is important." She sobered "But believe me, I didn't leave for some noble reason, I was angry and I handled that situation in the worst way possible. I guess we both needed to leave home in order to truly learn to grow, because you weren't growing in your house Percy, you needed time alone to sort things out. And I, well, I'm just here. Besides, you had already decided to speak to your family. I think, you had that decided before today, you were just trying to find the courage and discover the best way to do it."

"Well I can't now." He muttered bitterly "I told you what Thicknesse said would happen if I tried to speak to any of them."

"But you're planning something anyway aren't you?"

"I've already sat still too many times, too in love with the rules and others have gotten hurt. I've been a terrible brother, and a terrible person. I know what I have to do now, the Ministry is going to hunt down muggle-borns, and I need to find a way to protect them, to hide them until this is over. Oliver says he'll help me, I think his Quidditch friends will help him, and I even think that Arcadia may help as well. I just have no idea how to do this, where to hide them, how to get them there once we find a place."

Her hand found his shoulder and squeezed it. Percy looked up to see her nodding at him with determination. "And now you have me to help, in whatever way I can."

He felt the smile on his face before he even registered it. She returned it and Percy felt a warmth in his stomach. Maybe…

"Percy? Audrey?" The door came open and Joscelind poked her head in shyly. She had to turn a bit before she finally saw the two of them sitting on the floor. Oliver's head poked out from behind her, looking extremely disappointed when he saw where they were sitting.

"Sorry to interrupt," he said "But we're getting worried for Percy's sake, shouldn't you be getting back before long? Just in case they really are watching?"

Audrey stood up first and nodded.

Dorian's voice sounded down the hallway, "I also think however, that before he leaves we need to come up with some sort of a plan about this hiding muggle-borns idea that you all have."

It was important to have a plan, but Percy felt so tired and they needed more time, hours of time to come up with anything solid. But Audrey was speaking, so he listened, "Where to hide them? We'll, the answer is quite obvious to me: they're muggle borns. They'll know how to live in the muggle world, pretending that they're without magic. All they'll need are new identities. We won't be able to get them through Diagon Alley, we'll have to use the forest or…other places. Besides, I'm sure muggle-borns around the country are already going into hiding themselves."

"It's been a while for me." Joscelind responded "I've become so reliant on magic. Audrey you've seen how I am in your office. It doesn't feel comfortable anymore."

Audrey laughed "That's because my office is designed to make even muggles feel uncomfortable. Lawyers aren't made to be lovable. We're made to win."

"Nevermind that," Dorian interjected. "Many are an intrinsical part of this society, they're going to refuse to leave."

"I think the best we can do first is to identify them." Oliver added quickly, knowing also that they'd all need more time for this, "Percy, you'll be in the Ministry still, you can get their names, you can keep us updated on the laws before they're even passed."

Audrey nodded in agreement, adding "You know what that means right Percy?" There was a guarded, hardened look on her face again, but was that a trace of concern in her eyes for him? "That means you're going to have to pull a thorough acting job, say what you need to say, do whatever you need to do to convince them that you really are following their orders."

"Right," Percy nodded "Identify first. You're right, I should go home. Oliver, are you going to have room for everyone?"

"Well someone'll have to join me on the bed." The Keeper grinned "Or I can do the chivalry thing and give the two ladies the bed and Dorian and I can fight for the couch."

Audrey looked at the bed somewhat dubiously. "Cut me some slack Audrey!" Oliver exclaimed "If I'd known I'd have guests I would have cleaned it up."

"Don't worry Ol." Joscelind smirked "We can sleep on it tonight and wake up tomorrow with the lovely Eau de Oliver fragrance clinging to our skin."

Dorian laughed, going outside, Oliver followed somewhat put out and Percy only chuckled. He had no idea why it was funny, but it just felt like the right time to try to laugh – otherwise he'd have strangled Oliver for the simple image of Audrey on his bed and smelling of him. "Good night." He wished the two women and apparated back to his flat.

Walking over to his bed, wondering how he'd be able to act well enough to convince the entire Ministry of the lie, he fell on it and was finally instantly asleep.


	14. Quidditch A great political mess

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 14

It was finally morning. Getting up into a sitting position, Audrey noted that Joscelind was still asleep. It was pretty miraculous actually, thinking that all of the things that happened yesterday were already past, already owned by memory. What a yesterday it was.

Taking this opportunity of solitude, Audrey reached into her jeans pocket to pull out the lump she had felt there since awakening the night before. While she knew that Percy and the players would not harm her, that did not mean she did not appreciate an escape. She knew Arcadia's work as she held in her hand a small, soft, velvet pouch. Opening it Audrey noted the keychain that rested inside. There were four keys – which were also four portkeys to different places: one to Arcadia's apartment she was sure, another had the Puddlemere Headquarters logo set into the head, so that would take her to the office, the third key had the logo for the Falmouth Falcons on it, Arcadia's office then, and the final key looked like ordinary muggle metal, lacking the wizarding design and aesthetics of the first two. This fourth key was most likely an emergency escape to some trusted muggle location.

Audrey smiled, as she tied the bag back up and slipped it into her pocket. While she knew that everyone here would need her help, she'd have to find a way to slip away sometime to solve her own mystery. She'd have to learn how to apparate sometime, or at least the Portus spell. She after all, could not keep relying on Arcadia to bail her out. Especially now that Arcadia had that Marcus Flint to keep an eye on. Who on earth was that man? Audrey knew who all the players and reservists in each team were, and she did not recognize that name. Hells, that face would have stood out earlier. How did Arcadia know him? But that was not for her to worry about now, what she had to consider was her own fate.

She'd help this group come up with a plan, and then she'd be on her way. Audrey was sure that Percy and the rest of them would be able to take care of themselves better without her holding them back with her semi-magical competency.

Percy Weasley, what an oddity. What a family too, the Weasley's were the complete opposite of her own family it seemed, and she had no idea how to fathom growing up in a household like that. Despite the noise though, she could feel the warmth and security of them through Percy's words, or maybe it was just nostalgia playing with all of them. As she quietly left the bedroom to get to the kitchen, she pondered the dangers of romanticizing memory, turning reality into fantasy, and getting lost in nostalgia. It was nostalgia that made her think about Percy all too often. That did not make any sense though, she barely knew him, but she knew that meeting him awoke waves of past events that she thought she had shut behind her. At least however, meeting Percy and facing these memories gave her a sense of purpose; she had something to do now, to rebel, to fight and not hide. It was refreshing to have something to fight for after drifting for so many years.

She passed a sleeping Dorian, who had apparently, won the couch.

"Good morning." It was Oliver, whispering the greeting, sitting at his small table having something hot. He had obviously just woken.

Audrey smiled in response, taking a seat opposite him. She had no idea why, but from the first moment Joscelind and Dorian entered her office with Oliver in tow, she felt a protective liking towards him. That had never happened to her before, no matter how sweet the face was, but it happened with Oliver. She knew his background and knew the reality of these professional Quidditch players: good mates to party with, relatively fun to talk to, but get them into the game and they become so caught up in their wars that they'd do almost anything to win. Would Oliver try to bump off a team he particularly did not like? Of course. Would he cause injury to a rival seeker to win the next game? Most assuredly. Would he bravely try to take on a crowd of hooligans on his own? Unfortunately, the answer to that question was also a yes, and yes was also the answer to 'Would Oliver do everything he could to go up against an malevolent Ministry?' Then again, no one ever said that people had to make sense, only that one had to accept them they way that they were.

"Sleep well?" He did seem genuinely concerned.

"Very well Oliver, and thank you so much, you've been forced to provide such excellent hospitality on a very short notice."

Oliver just smirked "You always this polite in the morning? Or just in general?"

She had to laugh at that. "I'm not a polite person Oliver. I'm a lawyer remember?"

"About that, I'm sorry."

Audrey was confused, and it must have shown on her face because Oliver continued explaining himself. "I realize I was a complete bastard after you cleared me. Sorry about that, I suppose I was worked up over the trial and, I guess I've always been irrationally idealistic." She felt the smile on her face.

"You saw Flint and I yesterday, well that goes back to our days at Hogwarts. He was damn good at cheating, but my team tended to defeat his anyway. I got used to that, winning just because the passion was there and it seemed right. I guess I'm too used to the world being black and white like that, and I've always wanted things to be as clear as possible. I should accept now that it's not possible all the time."

"You know Oliver, that trial frustrated me because I knew you were innocent, but all the information was being denied to me. I was angry, and I reacted the way I did because I was forced to win a trial not through factual means. Yes, I have to admit, I'm good at what I do but I'm a pretty lousy lawyer, I mean, lawyers are just supposed to win at whatever the cost. I'm not good at that. I think too much." She grinned. Let him think she was joking, she knew it was the truth. She hoped that would distract him from the question of her being on the run.

"Hope you don't mind my asking, but why are you on the run?" Apparently she failed, and Oliver never minded being as blunt as possible.

"I found out something I was not supposed to know, it involves murder, but why those particular murders should still matter is beyond me. I don't know, it has something to do with your case, but they don't seem to be after you or even watching you all that closely…just me." Audrey paused, suddenly thinking of something "I hope Percy knows better than to try to snoop for me."

Oliver only gave a wide grin at that. "He's a Weasley. He may have left his family but I know them. I played Quidditch with three of his brothers. You can bet that he'll try to help you."

A feeling of anxiousness ran through her, the last thing she needed was for Percy to be a hero over this, he had his own skin to worry about. "That's not good. He needs to concentrate on the muggle-borns, not to mention himself."

She saw Oliver's expression darken "We'll just have to do well to remind him occasionally to remember himself when we get the chance. I think that's what went wrong before, at Hogwarts and then even when he left his family. I think he forgot who he was, and got caught up in who he thought he was." The Keeper shrugged. "Not for me to judge though."

Audrey was nodding in agreement before she thought to dig. "Were you two close at Hogwarts?"

"No."

"How do you know so much about him?"

Oliver smiled, cannily this time. "What, think I fancy him?"

What a question! She was thinking too many things that made no logical sense when it came to Percy, damned if she knew why. She fixed him with her lawyer look and only asked back. "Do you?" She hoped it was obvious that she was joking.

That bastard Keeper was laughing. He was laughing so hard in fact that he was tearing and clutching his stomach in pain. Dorian must really be exhausted if this was not waking him. She decided to fix her frostiest stare at Oliver until he stopped laughing and started explaining.

Noticing her glare, Oliver forced himself to stop, though he was still grinning and couldn't stop the occasional giggle from escaping. "Sorry, I didn't mean to laugh at you, it's just that you have no idea the kind of rumors that run around a school when you've got just one roommate for seven years, and you're both madly in love with your future careers. Though I'll admit I was more in love with Quidditch to the point that there was no time for anything else, whereas Percy actually found time for a girlfriend." He paused at that, looking at her carefully before continuing.

"Look, if I did decide to…play for the other team, maybe I could do worse than Percy but truth is, it takes more than just being stuck together for seven years to build up the required rapport for a romantic relationship. For 'love' I suppose, you need that initial spark, you need to complete each other, or find yourselves being better people around that other person, balance you know? I find from watching my parents' example that the most important thing is the willingness to put the time into each other. Personally, I've always been distracted. Quidditch is very important to me, and every woman I've dated has never been able to accept that she does come in second to it. I figure, until I meet the one who can accept that, I'll just keep playing. Suits me fine."

Audrey was personally wondering why he was telling her all this. In fact, she was wondering the night before why Percy was beginning to tell her his life story but she welcomed it from him. Maybe it was just these times of stress, people needed to let things out and she came from an environment fresh from theirs.

Oliver was still chuckling. "So, why are you digging me for information on Percy?" At least he was easily amused, and did not seem to take offense at such insinuations.

Audrey summoned the pumpkin juice from the counter, needing a desperate drink to get her energy going. She knew she was turning red and was trying to figure out how to best answer his question. "I don't know honestly, just curiosity I suppose. It also just seemed odd to me that you both have almost nothing in common, and you even say that you both weren't close at school, and yet you seem to know him so well, and you also seem…very protective of him."

Oliver blinked, confused somewhat, before answering. "Audrey, remember how I got into that mess in the first place? I jumped into a crowd of hooligans." She had to grin at that. "Anyway, I find that it's a habit of mine, to know everything about the things that are going to be close to me, and then I suppose, protect them the best I can. When I began to play Quidditch, I kept tabs on all the players of each House team, made sure my own team was eating well, that they were mostly okay, even though they felt like killing me most the time for my all weather practices. Players from the other teams, I tried to keep up with developments; which captain was stupid enough to fall for his seeker, who had just gotten injured, etc. Granted the Slytherins managed to keep a lot of secrets from me, but we won at the end anyway." He concluded that with a smug grin. "When I found out my first year that I was only going to have one roommate, I decided to treat him as if he were one of the players, just to make sure that I'd be a good roommate, you know, care enough to know what not to do to piss off the other person in the room with you. It wasn't always easy, but in the later years he had Penelope to worry about, and she was quite demanding on his time so I got the room mostly to myself."

"I'll ask you about Penelope later." Audrey responded dryly "But I suppose you're right. You're just plain protective and a bit of a control freak. You're watching over him now, and now you're watching over Joscelind and Dorian. I suppose even me."

Oliver only shrugged "We're teammates after all, all United's slaves we are. And if we're really going to be some secret heroic group or whatever, that makes us into another kind of team. I have an advantage with Percy, Joscelind and Dorian in that I already know them from before but you," He clucked "The lawyers and office people were a different bunch, though now I'll need to keep my eyes open, especially on you." He either ignored or did not notice that she was not looking forward to being coddled.

"Now as for Percy, definitely need to keep an eye on him. I miss Hogwarts. I miss the peace that I had there a lot, and since we shared a lot of that peace together in the same room, there are memories tied to that school that are unique to just the both of us. In a way, I see protecting Percy as protecting my reminisces."

Nostalgia again, Audrey was beginning to feel extremely irritated at it.

"Besides, I know his brothers; Fred and George were really torn up when he left. They teased him all the time yes, but they tease everyone – bunch of troublesome wankers but a whole lot of fun they are. They figured they were doing him a favour, trying to get him to loosen up. You see, Fred told me once, that before Percy got caught up in this 'Perfect' and 'Ministry' mumbo jumbo he used to be happier, even used to joke around too. Unfortunately, they never really did make Percy laugh, and when he left, they saw it as a kind of failure. But now everyone is just angry apparently. I don't know, I guess it's just that he's a Weasley. Percy's older brother Charlie granted me the honour of being made Quidditch Captain early. Charlie was Seeker, and Captain before me. His seventh year he wanted to concentrate on his field studies on dragons and let me be Captain instead. He was a great mentor, and I'm grateful."

"Why tell me all of this?"

Now he had that smug smirk again. "I'm telling you all of this because you've been mad for Percy since my trial and I think you both need to teach each other some valuable lessons."

Audrey sat still, absorbing what Oliver had just said. Nevermind that there was no way she could be attracted to Percy, it did not make any sense. She met his statement with a steely silence.

Oliver leaned back in his seat. "Don't believe me? Fine. Ask Joscelind when she wakes up. You may kindly not want to discuss it with Dorian, though he knows. Figured it out before the rest of us."

"I think you're mistaken." 'You have to be' she thought. And damn if Dorian still has not let up on that.

"Of course you think I'm mistaken. I believe earlier, you wanted to ask me about Penelope?"

Damn him, she did want to know who Penelope was. Audrey already had a suspicion but then why should she care? People dated in school after all, she certainly did. In fact, just yesterday before seeing the face that came with the rest of the package, she was admiring Marcus Flint's body. Yes! She was not attracted to Percy, she was not. "Ex-girlfriend I'm guessing?" Damn, why did she ask?

Hiding his smile in his cup, Oliver nodded in the affirmative. Audrey sat down, looking at him expectantly. "Fred and George tell me he spent all summer writing letters to her, spent every moment he could with her, and genuinely thought he was in the throes of first love." 'First love' he had said in a theatrical dreamy fashion. The tone sounded so alien to Oliver as she knew him that she guessed it had to be imitated from the famous twins. So Percy was an old-fashioned romantic was he? Lucky for Penelope.

"They were together for three years, but of course these things don't always last. Have to try though, you never know unless you try."

"You make it a habit then? To keep up on the gossip of an ex-roomate you weren't close to just to fill in his potential future girlfriends?" Audrey asked rather dryly.

Now Oliver was finally getting irritated at her defensiveness. "What are you so paranoid about? I'm not going to harm anyone."

Audrey only looked at him with utmost calmness, making it clear that she was only trying to solve a puzzle. "What do you see yourself as Oliver?" She finally asked "Some kind of wizard-chess master? Some universal Quidditch strategist and the world is your own personal pitch to play with? I'll answer you though, because I don't see any harm in you knowing the answer to your second question; I'm not worried about you particularly, I'm just plain worried about everything in general. I worry that Percy is going to get lost in this new quest of his, from our brief discussion yesterday, I now know I have to worry about his tendency to overblow situations and his guilt trip won't help anything. Worse still I have no clue how we're going to pull this off – this…sudden mission of ours. Now apparently I need to keep an eye on you watching my every move and knowing anything about me."

Now quizzical, the Keeper asked "Why should that worry you? Professional Quidditch is one big political mess. We all keep tabs on each other. You have my file and you were my lawyer, I know you know a lot more about me than I know about you."

Audrey forced herself to reexamine her opinion of Oliver. He was after all, a budding professional, the youngest active player in the league, and had to play team politics just like the rest of them, if he wanted a long-term career in the sport. Audrey looked at Oliver in a new light, now acknowledging more than his open, honest nature, and noting his ambition and canniness when it came to his great passion. The chivalry was something naturally within him, that part that wanted to protect others, but passion for Quidditch could make him a different sort of survivor. He was a dangerous one this Oliver Wood, and she knew for a fact that everyone in United had so far been underestimating him in that respect.

Grinning at him, she only said "No wonder Arcadia wanted you. I bet she could have convinced you to put her before Quidditch on some days."

He gave Audrey a hard smile "I know. That's why I didn't touch her. I'm still young, I'm not stupid enough to let Quidditch go because of a very seductive, promiscuous woman…as stupid as I did feel at the time for not letting myself fall for her."

How did everyone on the team miss the fact that Oliver Wood was a control freak? It was difficult to see that before when he was a reservist and playing his cards right to not anger the wrong people, but she could see now that he liked planning, strategizing, and knowing everything, it was not only something he did for the sake of doing it, he enjoyed it.

"Audrey you saved my Quidditch career. Thank you."

"You're welcome."

"In return, and to express my thanks. I'll help you now. I'll help you in whatever you're planning to clear your name, and I'll help you in whatever way I can with Percy. How's that?"

Audrey laughed. "Thanks Oliver, for the offer, but there's really no need. I was just doing my job." She was going to ignore what he said regarding Percy.

"Quidditch is my life Audrey. It means more to me than just a job. No worries though, I'll find a way to repay you. But for now, I think it's about time we woke the two of them up. They certainly had less of a stressful day yesterday than us and look at them! Sleeping in!" Sounding like what he must have sounded like in his school days at Quidditch Captain, and then like a kid, Oliver ran into the living room raising a ruckus and pulling a still sleeping Dorian off the couch.

"Huh? Wuzzat?"

"Morning Nox! Did you have sweet dreams?!"

"Wha? Wood?! You bloody wanker I didn't sleep most the night!"

"Liar Dorian! You're a liar! I'm the one who didn't sleep most the night because you snore like a herd of stampeding hippogriffs!"

They were sounding such chaos, yelling at each other and mock wrestling that Joscelind came marching out from the bedroom to bark orders at them (this time everyone got to hear her Captain voice) to quiet down. Really, did they all just forget that yesterday happened? Horsing around like this?

But the image of the three Quidditch players treating the living room like the locker room after a game made Audrey smile. It was always these little moments after all, that made life worth it.


	15. Where do Mudbloods come from?

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 15

Percy was amazed that he actually awoke to a new day. He knew that he would not be released so easily from the situation as if it were all a bad dream, but he was hoping. There was a dark owl waiting patiently outside his window. He let it in reluctantly and read the note it carried: it was a summons from the new Minister for a private meeting at noon. It was 9am, Percy had slept in. Damn, well, if he was going to die today, he was sure that his friends could continue doing what they needed to do somehow. Three star Quidditch players made for rather brilliant strategists once they applied their minds to other things and Audrey would keep them in line.

Percy dressed hastily, intent on looking unruffled and calm. He was not going to let the new Minister intimidate him in the least. Choosing the stiffest of his robes, he flooed to the Ministry.

Stepping out of the fireplace into a fairly empty hallway, Percy surveyed the new environment. Ministry workers were called in to remove the statues of the witch, wizard, centaur, goblin and elf from the atrium, they were still in the process of doing that. Percy did not want to know what would take their place but he was fairly sure he'd have to find out soon.

No one was speaking to each other, and Percy took the opportunity to scope out the employees: who was overseeing and who was being made to work. Most importantly, who out of all the fearful faces looked happy, and who looked indifferent. Those were the ones he would need to watch out for.

Stepping into the lift alone and out into the familiar hallway that housed the Minister and his top staff, Percy walked directly to the Minister's office.

Pius Thicknesse preferred to keep his office along the same lines as Scrimgeour: plain and no-nonsense. The Minister was not alone in the room, a large man who Percy was sure was the death eater from the Hall was standing beside the desk and Dolores Umbridge was seated in front of the Minister.

"Percy!" She smiled at him "Please, come sit down." Dolores stood, dressed as always in one of her many very pink suits, speaking with that girlish tone and looking happier than he had ever seen her.

"The Minister and I were just talking about you Percy." She poured him a cup of tea. "I think we have worked well enough together over the past few years that I have an accurate judgment of you. I think that you should hear about our new Minister's vision for our community."

As if he had not already heard all he wanted about it, but remembering Oliver and Audrey's words about him being the sneak in the Ministry, he managed a stiff smile. Let them think that he was still trying to save his own hide and career. After the fight yesterday, Thicknesse was not going to believe he was a coward. He also would not believe Percy would be willing to help him so easily.

"So Mr. Weasley," Thicknesse began "I understand yesterday must have been a long day for you."

Keeping a calm demeanor at that was the hardest thing he ever had to do, but Percy reminded himself that Thicknesse could have been talking about events in general of the coup, not whatever he was up to afterwards.

"After all Percy, it must be difficult, the knowledge that you turned on your Minister. Granted you did not know at that time." Umbridge smiled sweetly.

"I have your record and files here Percy." Thicknesse indicated an orb and folder on the desk "You were wasted in Magical Cooperation, and then served with distinction under two very different Ministers."

So they were going with the flattery route. Why not? It worked so well before when Fudge used it. Percy allowed his body to relax a bit, nevermind the storm that was churning in his mind. He still said nothing however.

Thicknesse stood with a sigh "Have you ever wondered Percy, where mudbloods come from?"

Well what the hell kind of a stupid question was that? Percy knew his face must have shown his distasteful shock at the question because Umbridge smiled ever-so-sweetly at him. "It's not really such a ridiculous question Percy." She cooed.

How on earth he once respected that woman was a mystery to him. Oh wait yes, he was being blinded by praise, and she was his immediate boss. "Excuse me Dolores," Percy began in a shaky but determined voice "But I was called here to answer a rhetorical question about muggle-borns? I believe that the most logical explanation is that somewhere back in their family lines there was either a witch or a wizard, and that the gene lay dormant until the muggle-born in question was…born."

The expressions of the three in the room darkened considerably at his answer. Even the silent large death-eater standing in the back. Percy did not need to act now to look afraid, but he stayed right where he was, back stiff.

"Mr. Weasley," Thicknesse addressed him darkly "Let us return to that later, and conclude our discussion about your time here at the Ministry. It says that you have always applied yourself wholly and entirely to us, and that you left your family when they failed to fall into the Ministry opinion of the Dark Lord having returned. Yet, a year afterwards when Scrimgeour changed his opinion on this, you still distanced yourself. My predecessor was a very different man from Cornelius Fudge, and yet you still stayed. May I ask why?"

Percy swallowed, trying to find the right words to answer. He stayed because he was initially angry at himself for having followed his ambition, and then realized that he could redeem himself by helping Scrimgeour catch Voldemort as quickly as possible. "I stayed because my future is with this Ministry. I have dedicated my life to it, believing that the Ministry has cared for the well-being of our society for centuries! Even through the dark ages when muggles were burning us alive, and brought us into the modern era. I live to serve this community and that is done best through the Ministry."

Thicknesse nodded at his answer and picked up his file. "It says here that when you were at Hogwarts you said your life's goal was to become Minister for Magic."

"Obviously I have a lot to learn. At twenty-one, I'm hardly reaching for that." Percy shot back acidly.

Thicknesse nodded, somewhat pleased at this for whatever reason. "Are you ready to continue serving our community Percy?"

So they were back to calling him by his given name now. "I wish to remain in the Ministry." That came out fairly confident, let them all think I'm an ambitious bastard, at least that part is true.

"As you mentioned before Percy, the magical community's history with muggles has been far from peaceful. There was once a time when they hunted us down like animals, and we wizards were always overcome by their sheer numbers. But Percy, the muggles have never stopped hunting us, now they have simply become more cunning with their plans. You say that muggle-borns are descended from a witch or a wizard, but we have never found any proof of this Percy. No proof at all."

The Minister was looking at him intensely now, and Percy did not have to act to look slightly fearful. "So Minister," he started "Where do you believe muggle-borns come from?"

Thicknesse leaned back in his chair, smiling, and Umbridge was still staring at Percy, smiling sweetly. She could stare at him all she wanted, he was not going to touch her tea. After working under her for almost two years, he knew her tricks.

"Well Percy, that's the mystery isn't it? I've had my Unmentionables working on this conundrum since even before I became Minister." He grinned now. "It appears that the muggles have been most devious with their latest plot to be rid of us. By mixing with us they seek to dilute our power, and now the mudbloods. You see Percy, the only possible explanation there can be for mudbloods is this: that they have stolen magic from us! They have stolen magic from our community, thus weakening us! It is so clever you see, and we have been forced to take them into our numbers for this successful thievery! How else can we explain the existence of squibs? No more I say. It's too late to do anything about the mudbloods already born, we'll put them to work though, they've stolen from us and so they can provide some…services." The Minister stood and was now pacing the room, excited about whatever horrible plan he was concocting. Percy could only sit and watch in wonder, wondering how much Thicknesse actually believed what he was saying, imperiused or not.

"Some may perform labor, as is their place, and the rest we will cull. The half-bloods can stay, though they are clearly second-class citizens, weakened by their diluted blood. That means Percy, that pure-bloods such as ourselves must take the responsibility to lead in these trying times. We are the only ones who can truly save our community from the muggle stain. The mudbloods first, as they are the ones who are active in our community, leeching it from within. We can deal with the rest of the muggles afterwards, carefully, for they have strength in numbers."

Umbridge was nodding emphatically in agreement with the Minister. "You see Percy," she smiled sweetly, "In this burgeoning new society, there are many opportunities for advancement and influence for those who are able to best…make use of the chances given to them. There is so much more potential now than there ever was before. I can see you doing very well here Percy, this Ministry is still for you, should you wish to do the right thing."

'Do the right thing' she says. He knew why she would think that he'd be tempted by such an offer; he had already proved so many times in the past that he would leap at any opportunity for advancement.

"You believe that there is still room for me in this Ministry?" He tentatively asked.

Umbridge smiled broadly "Well Percy, there's no use us breaking up this team. We have both served well under two Ministers, there is no reason why we cannot serve under a third. We also appreciate the example you'd be setting for other young purebloods, so recently still under the influence of the late Albus Dumbledore. You would also set an example for your family…to see reason." The tone had definitely changed now, it was back to threats.

"As I have said so many times in the past and I will say again, the actions of my family are separate from my own. We make our own decisions and will not be held accountable for the actions of the other."

"Of course Percy, of course. Your achievements shall be considered your own." Thicknesse levitated Percy's record. "Shall I then expect you to continue here at the Ministry as my Junior Undersecretary?"

Percy stood "Yes Minister, of course." He responded somewhat stiffly, "I thank you for allowing me this opportunity." Then again, he should not overplay this either.

"You will still be reporting to Dolores of course."

"Yes Minister."

Thicknesse clapped him on the back. "See you Monday then. Mind you, return home to rest, don't go hopping around the place, you'll need your strength next week."

Putting all his willpower into nodding with relief and not in terror, Percy shook hands with the new Minister, then Dolores, nodded at the large man and tried to leave the office.

"Oh and Percy." Dolores caught him before he could leave the room.

"Yes Dolores."

"The Minister was just wondering before you came in, what you were doing in the Hall of Records yesterday."

Percy hoped that they did not notice his slight start. Looking at the new Minister he quickly decided to take a gamble hoped that it would pass. "Well Minister, I was actually retrieving your record for Rufus Scrimgeour."

Thicknesse's eyes hardened at first before he nodded and smiled. "Master Clio was most uncooperative with us. The stress of his job I suppose has finally begun to affect him at his age. We had him put into St. Mungo's but he apparently passed on this morning. Thankfully we still have trained archivists working for us. This of course does put me into a rather tedious place, being the only one able to access the records. I have changed the law to allow Dolores and a few other aides to read the records."

Master Clio was gone. Percy could not hide the sorrow, he enjoyed the old man's company when he did get into the hall. He knew better than to hope to gain access to those records and so did not fall to the bait.

"Well, Rufus won't be needing my record anymore. Have a good day Percy, and remember what I said, get your rest."

'Don't go hopping around the place' How would they really be watching him? Did Thicknesse know where he was the night before? It was possible he did and he was only keeping Percy close to watch him. Maybe the Minister was waiting for the group to act, and then he'd swoop in and arrest them all. It was possible. Merlin, it was all possible.

Percy made his way back to the Atrium where he saw the new statue being put up by the fountain. It was a grotesque thing, reading 'Magic is Might', resting on the bodies of muggles. Looking quickly away, Percy walked to the nearest fireplace and flooed back to his home. He fought down a wave of nausea at the thought of having to see that statue everyday of the workweek now. He also had to figure out how to continue protecting his group if the Minister truly was watching his every move.

A silver whisp floated in the air and formed into a snowy owl in front of him. "Thanks for everything and don't worry about me. Take care of yourself." Then it disappeared.

Percy resisted the urge to bury his face in his hands in frustration. Audrey had gone off again, and finding her would undoubtedly be more difficult this time around.


	16. Who's Alive?

Title: Goodbye, Nostalgia

Author: zazial

Time Period: DH

Pairings: Percy/Audrey, many others.

Disclaimer: JK Rowling owns Harry Potter and everything connected with him. She's kind enough to let us play with her creations the way we do.

Chapter 16

Oliver had no clue what was going on with that woman. She was suddenly looking at him like they were both just inducted into a secret society. He decided he needed to get away from crazy lawyers and go back to keeping company with Quidditch players. Now this, he understood. He was happy to see however, that his gut was correct about Percy and Audrey. He also knew that this pair could work out two ways: everyone could be happy that they were together because they bring out the best in each other, or everyone would perform the cruciatus curse on him for bringing together two of the stiffest, emotionally confused, crazy, irritating…! Okay Wood, calm down. You started this, you follow through.

As he kept a silly grin on his face while Jocelind lectured he and Dorian about the stupidity of waking the team Captain too early, he kept an eye on Audrey to make sure she did not do anything stupid. Like try to slip away.

All she did was look at his window.

Oliver followed her eyes to see a barn owl patiently waiting outside. Rising quickly, he let it in, took the note and tipped the bird. After it flew away Oliver noted three very nervous people looking at him.

"You know post is likely screened these days right?" Jocelind asked.

"I hope no one was being stupid, but I don't see how it could have gotten to me unless it was safe." Oliver shrugged. "Hell, it could just be from my parents asking me if I'm alright since they're stuck in Caribbean now on their vacation. Am I ever glad I got them that vacation."

He cracked the seal and smiled.

_Hi Captain,_

_Just wondering how you've been lately. Owl me when all is well._

_Katie_

"It's just a letter from one of my old Gryffindor teammates." Oliver reported. "No emergencies. We can expect a few of these. Now that it's the morning after everyone's going to be trying to figure out who's still alive and who isn't. Speaking of which, I really should be doing the same."

Another owl tapped the window, Oliver opened it and found a similar letter from Alicia.

"I sincerely hope." Jocelind whispered. "That no one I know was stupid enough to send me a letter by _owl._"

Oliver's eyes widened. He had not thought of that. It should be common sense for people to know that mail would be screened now, and if you had a friend who was likely to be hiding away, you should not owl them unless you really wanted them dead. 'Should be' was the key. Unfortunately, there were a lot of stupid people around. With Jocelind being so popular, there would be at least one fan out there with a small enough brain to try.

"We can't stay holed up here." Dorian nodded, looking at Jocelind in concern. "I mean, it can be one of our bases, but we need more than just your flat to escape to in times of crisis. It's not exactly defensible."

"My place." Audrey spoke up.

Dorian turned to look at Audrey as if she had lost all of her wits. "You're on the run Audrey, and you have no magical wards and defenses whatsoever! Do you even know how to apparate or fly a broom for heaven's sake?"

Audrey looked at Dorian coolly "I can't apparate or fly a broom. But I do know that the Ministry thinks I'm running. They won't expect me or anyone to touch my flat."

"Uh Audrey." Oliver decided to speak up. He did not want her to see the condition Law Enforcement left her home in "I've been to your flat since you left. It's not exactly habitable."

Audrey shrugged "I'm not talking habitability. I'm talking about an emergency backup plan. So long as we keep away from the windows and not leave through my door it should serve well as a temporary shelter of a kind. I wouldn't serve long-term though, I've seen you wizards and witches try to get around my flat. It tends to irritate most of you."

"The fact is," Percy continued, "It's probably being watched."

There was a knock on Oliver's door and everyone fell silent. Dorian indicated for Jocelind and Audrey to return to Oliver's bedroom while he settled on a chair out of direct view from the entrance. Oliver had to agree as he waited for the two women to hide. Keeping his hand in his pocket on his wand, he looked through the peephole to see Angelina Johnson and let out a sigh of relief. Still, it could be a trick.

"Hi Angelina."

While always a somewhat stern person, at Hogwarts Oliver remembered Angelina capable of cracking a few jokes and even pulling one over the twins occasionally. Of course, that probably had more to do with Fred having a crush on her than her actually outwitting them. The woman standing in front of him now looked serious and worried. He was sure this was the real Angelina, but still he had to make sure.

"Hope you don't mind if I ask you a question."

She sighed somewhat wearily but nodded, understanding the caution.

"When you became Gryffindor Quidditch Captain," he started "I sent you a letter to congratulate you and asked you mainly for one thing: what was it?"

Angelina smirked "One thing? More like three, you said, 'Don't go easy on them, make sure Harry doesn't kill himself with anymore heroics, and win Gryffindor the Cup' One thing, the man says. Are you really Oliver Wood? What did you say to McGonagall the first time she ever truly got angry at you?"

Oliver chuckled, she was letting him off easy. He felt that most people had to know this one "I said that I didn't care if Harry died as long as he was holding the snitch in his hand." Opening the door wider, he invited her in.

He hugged her when she did come in. Oliver had kept in touch with his old team via post but he had rarely seen them. Angelina and Alicia had recently come to his games and he knew that Katie had planned to make the next one, but that was cancelled now.

"Ah yes, Dorian," Dorian had stood relaxed but still wary "This is Angelina Johnson, she's one of the best chasers Gryffindor has had, and she took over as Captain after me."

She laughed as they shook hands "It's an honor to meet you Dorian, you're one of my favourite chasers, and damn Oliver for not warning me about the stress that came with the Captain's job."

Oliver did not bother hiding his grin "I enjoyed the stress of it though, I think it makes the team come alive and for me it was definitely part of what I enjoyed about being Captain."

"Yeah well that's you, that title made me a damn wreck. I was irritating even to myself. Having that fat hag as our Headmaster didn't help my mood that year either."

Oliver indicated the sofas and Angelina sat down. "Dorian and I ended up holing up here yesterday. I'm surprised that you made a journey outside, it's relatively unsafe right now. Do you know how Alicia and Katie? I got post from them so I assume they're alright but I'm not entirely sure. I'm sure that Fred and George are knee deep in trouble no matter what so…"

"Fred and George have closed their shop for today, I'm sure they'll be out soon though. I think they're still with their family. Alicia and Katie are actually meeting up with me later today at my place. I dropped by to see if you'd like to join us but you seem…busy." She indicated Dorian. Who in turn smiled stiffly and stood, indicating the bedroom. Oliver shrugged, meaning 'it's up to them if they want to come out.'

"I hope you've all passed your apparition tests Angelina, and that your place is warded, otherwise it's not safe to be holding…secret meetings."

"Hesitant Oliver? Something is up, you're never hesitant. And of course we can all apparate, that's actually how I came here, I just figured it'd be quite rude to turn up in your living room unannounced. You warded your place?" She was trying very hard not to look at where Dorian was going. Oliver saw him returning with Jocelind but Audrey was nowhere to be seen.

Looking around to ensure everything was secure, Oliver leaned closer to Angelina to whisper "Actually, your timing couldn't have been better. I think we're going to need your help." Angelina turned, saw Jocelind and her jaw dropped open. Oliver hid his smile as he recalled that his three chasers idolized this woman, he was sure they'd help him hide her.

Introductions were made and Oliver decided to be straightforward, as per usual "So Angelina, any idea where to hide Quidditch's most famous muggle-born?"

Her eyes widened as she pondered the question. "Fred and George tell me that Harry's already disappeared, most likely on some plan against You-Know-Who. They still haven't managed to find him. Muggle-borns are already disappearing, whether to go into hiding or because they've already been picked up…that's unclear. Argh, Alicia and Katie are actually the better thinkers, I just inspire people to perform miracles."

Oliver tried not to smile, Angelina was a brilliant thinker, she just never handled stress very well. "Calm down Angelina, if that's the case then of course I'll meet with you, three. When and where?"

"15:00 my flat. Don't bother knocking, just apparate directly in, and yes Oliver, the twins have put enough defenses around it." Oliver raised his eyebrows at that and Angelina smacked his arm. "I'm glad that this came up actually, we were going to discuss something very related to this issue. Well, I should get going anyway, I wasn't planning on stopping by long, Alicia's arriving at my place soon. Do I have permission to ask her and Katie? I'm sure between the three of us we'll be able to think of something."

Jocelind nodded, and after a brief farewell, Angelina disapparated.

"You know Oliver," Dorian was running his hand through his hair – his most nervous gesture "I think there are getting to be too many people knowing that Jos is here. I mean alright, there's the three of us, Audrey, Percy Weasley, and now three more people?"

"I trust them Dorian, but you're right, if this gets any larger, it'll be a tough secret to keep. So far seems rather quiet though. Where's Audrey?"

Jocelind answered "She refused to leave the room, said she didn't know this Angelina and was not comfortable with anymore people knowing where she was."

Oliver's eyes widened for a second before he briskly walked to his bedroom. When he opened the door, he was not surprised to discover that Audrey was nowhere to be seen.


End file.
